Radiohead released their new single "Burn The Witch" yesterday and, like the good, millennial-savvy artists they are, they had used their digital presence and social media to the maximum extent in the days leading up to the launch. By, er, not using it at all. The band slowly, over a few days, erased their website, Twitter account and Facebook page, and left a blank space, a wall of no sound, in their place. Where that other noted artist with a large body of work, Kim Kardashian, threatened to break the internet with her bottom, Thom York and co, being the nice, polite lads that they are, gently turned it off.
Until yesterday, that is, when "Burn The Witch" appeared on the band’s newly resurrected website with its lush, almost cinematic, strings and glorious wailing, accompanied by an eerily compelling claymotion animation video (think Wicker Man meets Wallace And Gromit). Cue, the music world talking about Radiohead – job done. OK, it didn’t get quite as much press as KK’s ass, but it surely had the desired effect by getting us thinking, tweeting, writing and just simply having an opinion about the band. Never mind that the music itself isn’t exactly reinventing rock’s wheel – who cares anyway? When was the last time anybody seriously did? So you may as well be playful and experimental with the other facets of the band.
And as for the grumbling about it all being a clever-clever cynical marketing ploy – well, what did you expect, that they’d take it to the Luddite extreme, disappear into a puff of digital smoke and never return? At least they’re trying to make a statement; at least they care about keeping us on our toes. Which is a damn sight more than Ed Sheeran or Mumford & Sons or Kasabian or, much as I love them, Arctic Monkeys, could ever manage. Each of those could release a new album every week for a year and not one of them would really surprise you. Quite what Radiohead are trying to say, though, obviously, I have no idea, but I like the fact that it’s something.
Some have gleefully pointed out that as the band are now making their work available on streaming services, they've gone back on Thom Yorke’s comments in 2013 that Spotify was "the last desperate fart of a dying corpse" and are therefore either hypocrites or sell-outs. Pah! Who cares? They’re a band, not a bunch of politicians and we can embrace the contradictions and experiments, and enjoy a band who still stick their necks out. However politely.
