miércoles, 18 de julio de 2012

Thom Yorke contributes to new Flying Lotus album ‘Until the Quiet Comes’

Flying Lotus has announced a release date for his new album which features Thom Yorke on vocals.

The album ‘Until the Quiet Comes’ will be out on October 1st (October 2nd in the USA) via Warp. Thom Yorke is again one of the collaborators, along with Erykah Badu, Thundercat, Niki Randa, and Laura Darlington. Tracklisting below. You can hear Thom Yorke on the track Electric Candyman. Thom Yorke previously worked with Flying Lotus on his previous album Cosmogramma. You can hear that one below.

01 All In
02 Getting There [ft. Niki Randa]
03 Until the Colours Come
04 Heave(n)
05 Tiny Tortures
06 All the Secrets
07 Sultans Request
08 Putty Boy Strut
09 See Thru to U [ft. Erykah Badu]
10 Until the Quiet Comes
11 DMT Song [ft. Thundercat]
12 The Nightcaller
13 Only if You Wanna
14 Electric Candyman [ft. Thom Yorke]
15 Hunger [ft. Niki Randa]
16 Phantasm [ft. Laura Darlington]
17 me Yesterday//Corded
18 Dream to Me



Radiohead live in Bilbao – Live Report

After a couple headlining shows in the south of France, Radiohead move further south and west into Spain for a headlining slot at the Bilbao BBK Live festival tonight.

Radiohead take the stage at 11:30pm right after Four Tet has wrapped up his set on the same stage. We will do our best to provide updates here and on our RadioheadLive Twitter feed. Stay tuned for the setlist.

No tweeters tonight…we’ll muddle through.

Setlist
01 Bloom
02 15 Step
03 Bodysnatchers
04 The Daily Mail
05 Myxomatosis
06 The Gloaming
07 Morning Mr Magpie
08 Pyramid Song
09 Reckoner
10 I Might Be Wrong
11 Nude
12 Lotus Flower
13 There There
14 Karma Police
15 Feral
16 Idioteque
——
17 Give Up The Ghost
18 Kid A
19 After The Gold Rush/Everything In Its Right Place
——
20 Paranoid Android



Radiohead live in Nimes – Live Report

Tonight Radiohead returns to the stage for the first show of their European tour at Les Arenes in Nimes, France. It’s also the first show since the stage collapse in Toronto and the subsequent canceled shows that followed. Tonight will obviously be a tough one for the band.

Caribou is once again supporting and Radiohead should be on stage shortly (likely around 8:45pm). We’ll do our best to bring you live setlist updates here as well as on our Twitter account.

OK, the show has begun and the lighting rig is quite different. The screens that used to hang and move over top of the band now appear to be fixed behind them and the giant bottle LED screen appears to be gone. However, Jonny’s telecaster is accounted for.

Setlist
01 Lucky
02 Bloom
03 Morning Mr Magpie
04 15 Step
05 There There
06 Staircase
07 The Gloaming
08 Separator
09 I Might Be Wrong
10 Pyramid Song
11 Nude
12 Identikit
13 Lotus Flower
14 Feral
15 Little By Little
16 Paranoid Android
——
17 Treefingers (live debut)
18 Give Up The Ghost
19 Videotape
20 Weird Fishes/Arpeggi
21 Ful Stop
22 After The Gold Rush/Everything In It Right Place
23 Idioteque
——
24 Reckoner

Lucky opens a show for the first time since 1998 (obviously a reaction to Toronto) and Treefingers, a song most assumed would never be played live, gets its live debut. Given the circumstances, that first encore looks like it would have been pretty intense. Videotape was played for just the second time this year.

For the final encore song of Reckoner, Thom thanked the crew and dedicated the song to “our friend Scott.” An emotional end to what was certainly an emotional night for the band. In addition, Scott’s photo was displayed throughout Reckoner.

The band play Nimes again tomorrow night.

And here’s video of Treefingers’ live debut.



Radiohead live in Lisbon – Live Report

Tonight in Lisbon, Radiohead headline the Optimus Alive Festival. Tonight’s show in Portugal is the last concert of this leg of the tour as the band are off to Asia at the end of the month.

The band will be on stage at 10:30pm and we will be providing live updates here and on our Twitter page as the setlist comes in. Check back later.

Setlist
01 Bloom
02 15 Step
03 Morning Mr Magpie
04 Staircase
05 Weird Fishes/Arepggi
06 The Gloaming
07 Separator
08 Pyramid Song
09 I Might Be Wrong
10 Climbing Up The Walls
11 Nude
12 Exit Music (For A Film)
13 Lotus Flower
14 There There
15 Feral
16 Bodysnatchers
——
17 Give Up The Ghost
18 Reckoner
19 Lucky
20 Paranoid Android
21 The One I Love/Everything In Its Right Place
22 Idioteque
——
23 Street Spirit (Fade Out)

And that’s it for this mini-European leg. The band will next play in Taiwan in ten days time. See you then.



Radiohead play first show since stage collapse, pay tribute to Scott Johnson

Radiohead were in France last night for their first performance since last month’s tragic stage collapse in Toronto, and in addition to some surprises in the set list—including the live debut of “Treefingers”—they payed tribute to Scott Johnson, the drum tech killed just minutes before the gates at Downsview Park were set to open to the public.

The tribute happened during the band’s third (!!!) encore. Photos from the event (taken by Twitter user @fittr_happier, via Consequence of Sound) show Johnson’s picture projected on screens behind the band while they played “Reckoner.”

Watch Radiohead debut “Treefingers” below.

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First Atoms For Peace single announced, includes Other Lives remix

Atoms For Peace will release their first single end of this month, remixing themselves and Other Lives.

The band Atoms For Peace has previously toured with the music of Thom Yorke’s album The Eraser. Alongside Thom Yorke, producer Nigel Godrich, Red Hot Chili Pepper’s Flea, Joey Waronker and Mauro Refosco played in the live band. For a while now, a new release has been rumoured under the name Atoms For Peace.

Atoms For Peace will release a remix of their own – yet unreleased – track Other Side as a b-side. Side A includes an Atoms For Peace remix of Tamer Animals by Other Lives. This release is set for August 6th on 12? vinyl. A limited edition of 300 hand numbered and stamped whitelabels will be available on July 30th [sold out], as well as digitally via iTunes. All releases are on Modeselektor’s Monkeytown label, with cat number 50WEAPONSXTR01.

A1: Other Lives “Tamer Animals – Atoms For Peace Remix” 06:19
B1: Atoms For Peace “Other Side – Stuck Together Remix” 07:54



Radiohead live in Nimes (Night 2) – Live Report

Radiohead once again play Les Arenes in Nimes tonight (have you seen the venue, by the way?) as they continue their abbreviated European tour. After last night’s emotional show the band will hoepfully feel more comfortable tonight.

Once again Caribou will be opening the show with Radiohead on stage around 9:45pm. We’ll be updating this post as the setlist arrives but be sure to also follow our Twitter account for updates as well.

The band have recently finished a lengthy soundcheck. They played: Morning Mr Magpie, Kid A, The National Anthem, Codex, All I Need, Climbing Up The Walls, House Of Cards, Myxomatosis, EIIRP, Street Spirit, HTDC, Airbag, Planet Telex, Supercollider, and Bloom.

Setlist
01 Bloom
02 Kid A
03 15 Step
04 Morning Mr Magpie
05 The National Anthem
06 The Gloaming
07 Supercollider
08 Codex
09 Airbag
10 Climbing Up The Walls
11 Nude
12 Exit Music (For A Film)
13 Lotus Flower
14 There There
15 Feral
16 Bodysnatchers
——
17 Treefingers
18 Give Up The Ghost
19 House Of Cards
20 Reckoner
21 Myxomatosis
22 True Love Waits/Everything In Its Right Place
23 Idioteque
——
24 Street Spirit (Fade Out)

And that’s it for tonight in Nimes. None of the newer songs tonight but a healthy does of OKC mid-set. Looks like that long first encore may be sticking around. Apparently the blend of EIIRP into Idioteque is pretty great.

See you Friday.



Bonnaroo Festival, With Radiohead, Phish and D’Angelo

MANCHESTER, Tenn. — Funk and soul held sway, if only by a plurality, at the 11th annual Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival, the four-day gathering that started on Thursday here, about 70 miles from Nashville. All three of Bonnaroo’s main-stage headliners — Radiohead, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Phish — drew on the power of rhythm, especially African-American rhythms, as organizing principle and kinetic pleasure.

The singer, songwriter and guitarist Annie Clark, known as St. Vincent, at Bonnaroo. More Photos »

ArtsBeatBreaking news about the arts, coverage of live events, critical reviews, multimedia and more.

Arts & Entertainment GuideA sortable calendar of noteworthy cultural events in the New York region, selected by Times critics.

A festival fan in the wee hours of Sunday morning after the D.J. set by Skrillex. More Photos »

The festival’s most newsworthy event was the return of D’Angelo, who made a great neo-soul album in 2000 and dropped out of sight a year later. His voice and charisma intact, he was singing funk and rock songs with a band led by Ahmir Questlove Thompson of the Roots. And the must-see set on Thursday night was by Alabama Shakes, whose songs reclaim all the spirit of 1960s soul music.

This year’s Bonnaroo peaked early with a spectacular set on Friday night by Radiohead, which is more than ever a hard act to follow, especially when heard through Bonnaroo’s magnificent sound system. Radiohead made its songs jitter and crackle, with new electronic overlays and abstract funk rhythms dancing through paranoia and foreboding. Its backdrop was a two-story wall of lights, constructed from recycled water bottles, that flickered with geometric patterns as if enclosing the band within cybernetic space.

The Red Hot Chili Peppers, on Saturday night, were pure musical sinew, an unstoppable, muscle-powered rhythm section knocking out rock and funk ideas from the 1960s through the 2000s, topping them with wild guitar and jumping all over the stage. Phish, Bonnaroo’s Sunday night finale, was in its most euphoric mode, leaning on the part of its repertory with roots in blues, funk and country; the pop-country hit maker Kenny Rogers, who had performed earlier on his own and with Lionel Richie, joined Phish on the huge stage to sing “The Gambler.”

In a way, Bonnaroo 2012 was a holding action. Radiohead and Phish were returning headliners — Radiohead from 2006 and Phish from 2009 — and this year’s overall lineup did not quite equal that of previous years. But Bonnaroo is never monolithic. With more than 150 bands on five large stages, along with smaller ones scattered around its 700-acre grounds, Bonnaroo could be folky as well as funky; it also had pop, indie-rock, electronic dance music, oldies and comedy. A few performers, like Tune-Yards, did double duty, performing live soundtracks for silent films in a movie tent.

When it began, Bonnaroo featured jam bands and their sources, and that foundation remains. The audience and vendors were awash in tie dye. Reminders to recycle and other environmental messages were omnipresent; the plastic cups could be composted. Performers cheerfully, or mockingly, addressed the crowd as “hippies.” And the Bonnaroo throng — about 80,000, many camped out on the grounds — is still ready to dance to everything from hip-hop to bluegrass. It’s an untrendy crowd, gathered for a good time.

Yet the pop landscape has changed over the last decade, and Bonnaroo has adapted in its own way. While more specialized jam-band festivals have modeled themselves on Bonnaroo’s early years, the current festival’s lineup now overlaps more with those of other festivals; the Red Hot Chili Peppers, for instance, will also headline Lollapalooza in Chicago. And what originated as a once-a-year event in Tennessee is available for endless replays on YouTube.

Some of the festival’s most enthusiastic audiences shouted along with the hip-hop chants of strong newcomers — the hedonistic Danny Brown, the pugnacious Yelawolf, the comical Das Racist and the socially conscious Kendrick Lamar — as well as with more established acts like the Roots, who have always been a robust live hip-hop band, and Ludacris, who brought a band of his own. The latest rediscovery of 1960s soul also played well at Bonnaroo: not just Alabama Shakes but also young bands backing mature soul singers like Sharon Jones (with the Dap-Kings) and Charles Bradley (with the Extraordinaires).

Bonnaroo’s schedule still had plenty of room for jam bands like Phish, Dispatch and Umphrey’s McGee, who played in Saturday’s wee hours, from 2 a.m. to just before 6 a.m. The Word, an instrumental jam-band coalition, brought together the steel guitarist Robert Randolph, the keyboardist John Medeski and two members of the North Mississippi All-Stars. The groups steamed through tunes from gospel and Stevie Wonder.

A good part of the Bonnaroo crowd savored instrumental passages as well as pop hooks. The meticulous arrangements of Bon Iver, with long stretches of hushed delicacy, held thousands of people transfixed when he played the main stage. White Denim, a band that goes barreling from tricky, musicianly structures to Texas boogie, drew roars of approval.

martes, 3 de julio de 2012

Radiohead Concert at Wall Street Protest Was Just Hoax

It seemed almost conceivable. Radiohead, the British band that has built a career on its distrust of authority, had just played two nights in Manhattan. The band’s presence would provide star power for a two-week-old protest movement that has complained of tepid media attention.

Still, the logistics of putting on a concert on short notice in Zuccotti Park, the protesters’ three-quarter-acre headquarters in the financial district, were daunting. Public address system? Crowd control? Permits?

Those doubts were readily confirmed by a call to the band itself.

The band’s spokeswoman issued a statement: “We can officially say this is not happening.” All the same, the Web was going crazy. Perhaps “officially” was a wink? Fans and the curious filtered toward the park.

The spokeswoman, Laura Eldeiry, issued a firmer statement. “It’s definitely not going to happen,” she said. “It’s a false rumor.”

At Zuccotti Park, the rumors refused to die. Maybe Thom Yorke, Radiohead’s leader, would show up with an acoustic guitar.

He would not. At 3:39 p.m., Occupy Wall Street’s publicist, Patrick Bruner, sent out a second e-mail.

“I got hoaxed. Radiohead was never confirmed. Completely our fault. Apologies. The band were victims in this hoax as well.”

Four o’clock came and went. Mr. Yorke did not show, though the band sent a note of support on Twitter. But the crowd in the park had tripled over the course of the afternoon.

Watch the Shins perform on the new season of Nigel Godrich’s ‘From the Basement’

A new season of Radiohead producer Nigel Godrich’s intimate, audience-less performance show From the Basement is set to premiere this summer, and so far the lineup sounds as big as we’ve come to expect: The Shins, Feist, and Red Hot Chili Peppers are just a few of the artists set to be featured.

“I think what happened was MTV came along in the ’80s and destroyed the way that people film music on television,” Godrich told EW in a recent interview. “The performance ended up in the edit, and it wasn’t very direct. It’s a selfish thing, really—as a music fan, I really wanted to see people performing on television, so we went ahead and did it. Musicians hate doing TV because it’s such a different world and a horrible environment for them, so wouldn’t it be cool for me as a music person to do a TV show? Then I could get something out of them that TV shows wouldn’t get.”

The new season will move into 3D territory, though Godrich assures EW it’s not gimmicky, and that it will still be available in standard definition on a number of platforms as well.

Radiohead had one of the best results from the tapings, even releasing their King Of Limbs performances as a DVD. Check out an advance clip of the Shins performing “Bait and Switch” on the show over at EW’s site.

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Listen to 8-bit recreations of Radiohead’s ‘OK Computer’ and ‘Kid A’

If you liked the chiptune cover of The Smiths’ “This Charming Man” that the internet obsessed over for an internet minute a couple of months ago, you’ll probably love these new 8-bit recreations of two of Radioheads biggest albums, OK Computer and Kid A.

Created by composer Quinton Song, the recreations sounds appropriately digital, and add a goofy touch. Listen to both below. [via Stereogum]

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HITS AND MISSES PODCAST: Cramming into a free Flaming Lips show, the Emily White controversy, and the greatness of Usher

Hits and Misses is a weekly podcast hosted by the AUX.tv editorial team, who round up, dissect, and make awesome jokes about the week’s music news.

Just in time for another dull summer weekend, AUX is pleased to bring you the third episode of our news roundup podcast, Hits and Misses, posted every Friday around the end of the day. So load up your Zune-pods with our invective musical insights and start your weekend right. Or, start it this way. Whichever.

In this week’s episode, we discuss the agony and ecstasy of a free Flaming Lips show in Toronto, Emily White kicking the free download hornet’s nest, and figure out the samples on Usher’s new album.

Stream it here (or subscribe):

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Radiohead live in Montreal – Live Report

After touring the United States and Mexico, Radiohead have arrived to play their first two (and only) Canadian shows of the 2012 tour. Tonight, the band take the stage at the Centre Bell in Montreal, Quebec. As usual, the band should be on stage around 8:45pm after Caribou’s opening set.

We’ll be live updating this post as the show takes place with all the setlist info and you can also follow our @Radioheadlive twitter account for updates. We’ll be sure to pass along any soundcheck and live streaming info if we get it.

Setlist
01 Bloom
02 There There
03 Kid A
04 Morning Mr Magpie
05 The Gloaming
06 Separator
07 I Might Be Wrong
08 Staircase
09 Pyramid Song
10 Climbing Up The Walls
11 Nude
12 Lotus Flower
13 Paranoid Android
14 Feral
15 Little By Little
16 Idioteque
——
17 How To Disappear Completely
18 The Daily Mail
19 Myxomatosis
20 Reckoner
——
21 All I Need
22 Street Spirit (Fade Out)
23 True Love Waits/Everything In Its Right Place

No red pants tonight. Kind of a weird setlist, too, in that there were no new songs tonight (Identikit, Ful Stop, etc) and a rare show off for Give Up The Ghost. Leg 3 wraps up tomorrow in Toronto.



Radiohead in China

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A Carbon Catalyst for Half a Century On the eve of their Fourth of July concert in Salt Lake City, the Beach Boys still exhibit the political tensions that divide us all.

Radiohead reschedule summer shows after stage collapse destroys light show

Radiohead have been forced to reschedule a handful of upcoming European dates after last weekend’s tragic stage collapse in Toronto destroyed their elaborate lighting rig. In addition to killing drum technician Scott Johnson, the band says the collapse destroyed their light show.

“This show was unique and will take many weeks to replace,” read a statement released today. “The collapse also caused serious damage to our backline, some elements of which are decades old and therefore hard to replace.”

Dates affected include shows in Italy, Germany and Switzerland. New dates are expected to come out on June 27th.

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Watch Radiohead play two new songs at their tour opener last night

Radiohead kicked off their U.S. run of shows in Miami last night, and among the 24-song set were two new songs {or so we’re told. We certainly don’t know anymore). And Thom Yorke in a ponytail.

Check out the new songs below, and the full set list if you’re interested over here.

“Identikit”

“Cut A Hole”

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Radiohead Postpones European Shows

The stage collapse that killed a Radiohead crew member last Saturday in Toronto also destroyed the band’s sophisticated light show, forcing the British group to postpone seven concerts in Europe over the next two weeks while repairs are made, the band said on Thursday in a statement. That means Radiohead will skip a swing through the Italian cities of Rome, Florence, Bologna and Codroipo, a two-night stand in Berlin and a stop at Canton de Vaud in Switzerland. It will resume the tour in Nimes, France, on July 10.

“The collapse also destroyed the light show – this show was unique and will take many weeks to replace,” the band said. “The collapse also caused serious damage to our backline, some elements of which are decades old and therefore hard to replace.”

New dates for the postponed shows will be announced on June 27. The Ontario labour ministry is investigating the accident during which a massive superstructure holding lights over the main stage crumpled and fell, killing a roadie, Scott Johnson, and injuring three other stagehands.
Investigators have been combing through the wreckage and have requested blueprints of the temporary stage, which had been erected in Downsview Park in Toronto. The main focus of the investigation is Live Nation, the giant concert promotion company behind the event, but three other companies hired to put on the show are also being scrutinized: Optex Staging and Services, Nasco Staffing Solutions and Ticker Tape Touring LLP, The Toronto Star reported.

Ticker Tape Touring is controlled by the band: the guitarist Jonnny Greenwood; his brother, the bassist Colin Greenwood; the drummer Philip Selway; the guitarist Ed O’Brien; and the singer Thom Yorke are listed as board members. It remains unclear what the touring company’s role was in erecting the stage or ensuring its safety, Canadian investigators told The Star.

Mr. Johnson, 33, of Doncaster, England, was an accomplished drummer who made a living as a stagehand on rock tours, tuning and caring for drums. He had been hired earlier this year to manage the drums for the “The King of Limbs” tour, The Star reported. The day after Mr. Johnson’s death, Radiohead posted a letter on its Web site: “He was a lovely man, always positive, supportive and funny; a highly skilled and valued member of our great road crew. We will miss him very much. Our thoughts and love are with Scott’s family and all those close to him.”

Victim of Radiohead Stage Collapse Identified as Drum Technician

The man killed when a stage roof collapsed Saturday afternoon just before a Radiohead concert in Toronto has been identified as Scott Johnson, 33, from South Yorkshire, England. He was a drum technician for the band, the BBC and The Globe and Mail reported. Mr. Johnson also worked for Keane, another British band.

Three people were injured in the collapse, which occurred shortly before 4 p.m. Saturday on a temporary stage that had been erected in Downsview Park. An unidentified 45-year-old man was taken to a hospital with a head wound that the police said did not appear to be life-threatening. The two other men were treated for minor injuries.

The accident took place just an hour before the gates opened. An estimated 40,000 people were expected to attend the concert that night, which was to start at 7 p.m.

Inspectors from Ontario’s Labor Ministry were combing the wreckage to find what caused the superstructure over the stage, which was designed to serve as a roof and to hold lights and other apparatus, to come crashing down onto the stagehands who were setting up instruments, microphones, amplifiers and other equipment.

Though there were several similar accidents at festivals and concerts last year, most of them involved high winds. The weather on Saturday in Toronto was fair with light breezes.

Radiohead in Print: Read All About It

When Radiohead announced its new album, ''The King of Limbs,'' last month, it did so in the high-tech, media-smart way its fans have come to expect: a brief note online, followed by a rush when the songs were made available for download a day earlier than expected.

Phase 2 of the promotion is a lot less 21st century. On Tuesday, the day that CD and vinyl LP versions of ''The King of Limbs'' were released (along with another release of the download), the band distributed copies of a free 12-page newspaper called The Universal Sigh at 61 locations around the world, including three in Manhattan. Although there's little in the newspaper that explicitly advertises the album (the title and a few scattered lyrics are all that one reader/listener could find on a quick perusal), its existence to some extent also promotes yet another iteration of ''The King of Limbs'': a deluxe edition, which costs about $50 and includes two vinyl records, a CD, a download and artwork ''all in a special 'newspaper' format,'' the band said.The Universal Sigh was released at 1 p.m. on Tuesday, and at about 1:20, the Times Square distribution spot was fairly quiet. Three young people, one with an old-fashioned paperboy bag slung over his shoulder, held up copies of the paper and asked passers by, ''Are you a Radiohead fan?'' Most people apparently weren't, because a reporter worried about being 20 minutes late to the release had an easier time getting a copy than one usually would for discounted Broadway tickets at the TKTS booth.

The contents of The Universal Sigh are a bit like Radiohead's liner notes: abstract, wordy, pretty serious, filled with scratchy artwork, and perhaps hinting at some kind of mystery. New Musical Express, the British music magazine, did its best with a ''What Does It All Mean?'' item. The magazine points out that like the album itself, the newspaper is filled with references to nature, including stories written by the authors Jay Griffiths and Robert Macfarlane. There are also references to Norse mythology and Goethe, and drawings of what might be ghosts, or maybe fish (or bats).

Radiohead's own answer to those questions might be included in a poem called ''Across the Great Divide!'':Why does this not add up?A spider to a fly.A universal sigh.A giant turtle's eyes.Don't blow your mind with why.

This is a more complete version of the story than the one that appeared in print.

PHOTO (PHOTOGRAPH BY FRED R. CONRAD/THE NEW YORK TIMES)

Radiohead move postponed European dates to September

As announced last week Radiohead had to postpone seven shows in Europe due to the destroyed lighting equipment when the stage collapsed in Toronto.

The shows in Switzerland, Italy, and Germany are now rescheduled for the end of September 2012.

SEPTEMBER
Thursday 20th – Switzerland, Canton de Vaud – Quarry of St Triphon
Saturday 22nd – Italy, Roma – Hyppodrome Capanelle – Rock in Roma
Sunday 23rd – Italy, Florence – Parco Delle Cascine
Tuesday 25th – Italy, Bologna – Arena Parco Nord
Wednesday 26th – Italy, Codroipo (Udine) – Villa Manin
Saturday 29th – Germany, Berlin – Wuhlheide (this replaces the 6th July show)
Sunday 30th – Germany, Berlin – Wuhlheide (this replaces the 7th July show)

All original tickets are valid for the re-scheduled date.
However, if you are unable to attend the re-scheduled date please visit the tour date page on Radiohead.com and click on the relevant date for refund information.



6 days ago by Adriaan Pels in Radiohead News | You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Jonny Greenwood, Radiohead’s Runaway Guitarist

Christaan Felber for The New York TimesGreenwood, right, and Thom Yorke during sound check before a Radiohead concert in Miami.

On the morning of Sept. 12, 2011, a white Land Rover with a dragon on the door ferried the Radiohead guitarist Jonny Greenwood, his longtime recording engineer Graeme Stewart and Radiohead’s co-manager Chris Hufford to Alvernia Studios, about an hour outside Krakow, Poland. For several years, when he’s not recording or touring with Radiohead, Greenwood has pursued a second career as a composer of orchestral music, and this day he was cutting new versions of two of his classical pieces, “Popcorn Superhet Receiver” (17 minutes, inspired in part by the sound of radio static) and “48 Responses to Polymorphia,” both of which are unabashed tributes to the early-’60s output of the Polish composer Krzysztof Penderecki, whose compositions abandoned melody in favor of dense, dissonant tone clusters. Greenwood’s recordings will be featured on an album due out in March on Nonesuch Records, along with two new performances of Penderecki’s work conducted by Penderecki himself.

Rock musicians’ ventures into film scores: a video round-up.

Greenwood's stage setup for a Radiohead show.

Greenwood cites an early-’90s concert of Penderecki’s music as a conversion experience; he’s obsessed with Penderecki the way a lot of people are obsessed with Radiohead. Chances are you’ve heard Penderecki’s music even if you think you haven’t; some of his more screaming-of-the-damned­ish pieces turned up on the soundtracks to “The Exorcist” and “The Shining,” and that’s his “Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima” seemingly ringing in Clive Owen’s ears during the long urban-warfare tracking shot near the end of “Children of Men.” So there was something full-circle about the Sept. 12 session, given that Greenwood owes his profile as a classical composer in large part to his work in film, particularly his deeply Penderecki-indebted score for Paul Thomas Anderson’s “There Will Be Blood.”

Alvernia Studios was founded in 2010 by the Polish radio mogul Stanislaw Tyczynski; it’s a full-service film production and postproduction studio that has six soundstages of varying massiveness. It is also a profoundly weird-looking place. This is because Tyczynski, in addition to being one of the richest men in Poland, is a huge fan of H. R. Giger, the Swiss artist/designer/night-terror-sufferer who’s most famous for creating the creepy biomechanical look of the aliens from the “Alien” movies. So nearly every inch of Alvernia has been modeled, at what looks like absurd expense, and with impressively bonkers disregard for the facility’s future resale value, on Giger’s work. All the hallways look like the birth canals of some extraterrestrial apex-predator with acid for blood. Even the men’s-room-door handles look like spinal columns. The complex itself is housed in 14 large domes linked by glass-enclosed tunnels; to get from one dome to another, you have to wait for a stone-faced, combat-booted security guard (no, seriously) to press his thumb to a keypad that opens a set of blast doors.

Yet as I sat in the control room (itself styled like the bridge of a doomed spacecraft) and listened as Greenwood and Graeme Stewart engaged in some “Lost in Translation”-ish negotiations with the Polish engineer at the mixing console — a stern woman in socks and sandals, with a sensible soccer-mom haircut — the studio’s bizarre aesthetic seemed appropriate for what they were doing on this day. “Dry and close and uncomfortable is good,” Stewart told the engineer. (He was trying to persuade her not to run the sound of the orchestra through a reverb unit called a Lexicon — “dry” in this context meant “unprocessed.”)

Greenwood tends to wince when he walks into a room, as if in anticipation of mortification to come. He was wearing a wrinkled white dress shirt; his black pants were tight but hung low on his hips; and his hair was a heedless mop. The overall schoolboy vibe was enhanced by the fact that he was still wearing his backpack, which contained a pinkish-orange T-shirt, a copy of the manga master Yoshihiro Tatsumi’s graphic novel “Abandon the Old in Tokyo,” a MacBook and a spiralbound copy of the score for Pen­derecki’s “Polymorphia.” He’s 40, but he looks about 15; that’s roughly how old he was when he joined Radiohead, which makes me think back to someone who once suggested to me that when you join a band, you arrest at whatever age you were at that moment.

Radiohead’s OK Computer released 15 years ago today

Today marks the 15th anniversary of Radiohead’s third album OK Computer.

Released in the UK on June 16th 1997, the record soon became a classic album in music history and reached the number one position in the UK album charts. OK Computer has sold 4.5 million copies worldwide so far.

I remember buying the album on friday june 13th – albums in the Netherlands are released 3 days before the official release date – at my local record store. And yes, people actually went to record stores to get new music. I think there weren’t that many albums I played so many times, over and over again. Also in anticipation of Radiohead’s live show in Utrecht, only a week later. 15 years later, OK Computer is still one of my favourite albums of all time. Today is OK Computer Day!

When did you first hear OK Computer? Did it kick in right away? Do you still give it a spin now and then? Love to know. Please share.



17 days ago by Adriaan Pels in Radiohead News | You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Billy Corgan: I’ll Piss On Pompous Radiohead

Speaking to Antiquiet the Smashing Pumpkins frontman said he will piss on Radiohead: “I can’t think of any people outside of Weird Al Yankovic who have both embraced and pissed on rock more than I have. Obviously there’s a level of reverence, but there’s also a level of intelligence to even know what to piss on. Because I’m not pissing on Rainbow. I’m not pissing on Deep Purple. But I’ll piss on fucking Radiohead, because of all this pomposity. This value system that says Jonny Greenwood is more valuable than Ritchie Blackmore. Not in the world I grew up in.

“Is Ritchie Blackmore a better guitar player than me and Jonny Greenwood? Yes. Have we all made valuable contributions? Yes. I’m not attacking that. I’m attacking the pomposity that says this is more valuable than that. I’m sick of that. I’m so fucking sick of that. I’m so fucking sick of it and nobody seems to tire of it.”



20 days ago by Adriaan Pels in Radiohead News | You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Stage Collapses Before Toronto Radiohead Concert

A collapsed stage at the site for a Radiohead concert in Toronto on Saturday.Tara Walton/Toronto Star, via Associated PressA collapsed stage at the site for a Radiohead concert in Toronto on Saturday.

A massive rooflike structure collapsed onto a temporary stage for a Radiohead concert in Toronto on Saturday afternoon, hours before the band was supposed to go on, killing a stagehand and injuring at least three other workers, CNN and the CBC reported.

Radiohead, a British alternative rock band, canceled the concert. No band members were on stage at the time of the collapse, but members of concert crew were working in the area. A 30-year-old stagehand was found dead at the scene, while a second worker, 45, suffered a head injury and was taken to Sunnybrook Hospital, said Ian McClelland, the deputy commander of Toronto Emergency Medical Services.

The park was not open, but a crowd of people was waiting outside for the show when the collapse occurred. The gates had been scheduled to open at 5 p.m.

The accident victims were not immediately identified. They were setting up for the concert when a “scaffolding-type structure” 40 to 60 feet above the main stage collapsed, according to Capt. Mike Strapko of the Toronto fire department. A video filmed from a helicopter showed that a metal frame that served as a roof, still covered with a blue tarp, had crumpled the space where musicians were to appear.

The weather was fair, with no significant winds, the authorities in Toronto said.

Last year, a spate of collapses at outdoor concerts led to calls for more regulation of temporary stages, roofs and lighting rigs. Most of the accidents involved high winds. The worst occurred on Aug. 13, when a gust of wind caused a roof over the main stage to collapse at the Indiana State Fair, killing seven people who were waiting for the country band Sugarland to perform.

On July 17, the roof of the main stage at the Ottawa Bluesfest came crashing down in a storm while Cheap Trick were performing. It was prevented from crushing the musicians and crew by a truck that bore the brunt of the collapse.  On Aug. 6, high winds toppled a lighting rig at an outdoor concert by the Flaming Lips in Tulsa, Okla.

Later that month, on Aug. 18, a fierce storm tore through the Pukkelpop music festival near Hasselt, Belgium, causing three tents above stages to collapse, and killing five people.

A statement on Radiohead’s Web site said that tickets to the sold-out event would be refunded.

This post has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: June 16, 2012

An earlier version of this post misstated the hour at which the gates were scheduled to open for the Radiohead concert. It was 5 p.m., not 4 p.m.

Part 1 of Coachella Festival Wraps Up With Few Surprises

Damon Winter/The New York TimesA member of Pulp performing on Friday at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in Indio, Calif. More Photos »

INDIO, Calif. — Well, in the end it’s a business. But so it is at the beginning, and in the middle.

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An ambient question about the three-day Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, which ended on Sunday — or did it? — was whether the knowledge that it would be repeated exactly one week later in the same place and in the same order might alter the minute-by-minute feeling of it. You know, make it less special. Take away its aura. Does Coachella have an aura? It did once.

At large destination pop festivals, impressive surprises are experienced as acts of generosity: a balloon rising into the vast desert sky, a three-hour set. This is what unites large numbers of people and makes them feel innocent. Not the weekend’s quick-stop onstage guest appearances, from macro (Rihanna with Calvin Harris, Usher with David Guetta) to micro (the weirdo rapper Gonjasufi with the Los Angeles D.J. Gaslamp Killer).

Moments like those are as much for celebrity blogs and YouTube clips as they are for music fans. They don’t make you, standing in the crowd, feel particularly innocent. This year more than ever, the sets felt like jobs with a bit more self-promotional energy. I don’t remember a lot of shared awe. Will the surprises be better next weekend? Who knows, but it’s unlikely, with much less news media present.

This festival was founded 12 years ago on the premise of indie rock, which is, or has at times been, an art of innocence and skepticism — in other words, ideals. It’s grown out of that to become a festival of popular and semi-popular North American, English-language noncountry music, a megamart of sound for college kids.

It’s strong on Grammy winners, breakout acts from South by Southwest and the CMJ festival from a year or two ago, and, at this point, second-tier reunions. And dance music, which is likely to alter Coachella’s future more than any of the genres it has flirted with over the years. Aesthetically, it’s almost uncontainable, which is neither good nor bad; it’s just breadth, Spotify made real.

The oxymoron of a unique cultural event set to rerun was, obviously, a way to sell more tickets — 75,000 more — without making the festival too crowded. And that plan worked: both weekends sold out, and the crowd felt at capacity but no more. (Except in the dance tent, where many came to stay, and late arrivals squinted to watch house D.J.’s like Sebastian Ingrosso, Avicii and Kaskade.) The security felt nonintrusive and often invisible, as it should; this is a calm audience.

I saw violence only once, during the Death Grips’ set on Friday. That band, from Sacramento, has a great idea: nonidiomatic digital dance beats (sort of Southern hip-hop, sort of reggae, sort of hard-rock) with Zach Hill’s hypercreative, improvised live drumming on top, and Stefan Burnett’s mostly unintelligible yammering raps and chants. It’s bad-dream music, strong and strange, with dirty rock riffs occasionally drifting in: Pink Floyd’s “Astronomy Domine,” Link Wray’s “Rumble.” It’s music that can start fights, and it did.

The two-part festival is a big deal for music on the West Coast, and not just at the festival site, the Empire Polo Club. It means that a lot of these bands play other club and theater shows in Los Angeles before or after the festival weekends — many of them also booked by Goldenvoice, the festival’s promoter — and some of them run up to San Francisco in between the shows.

In 2012 the headliners didn’t define the festival or, on the face of it, lure concertgoers to spend money specifically here — as opposed to, say, Sasquatch or Lollapalooza, in May and August, each of which has about two dozen of the same acts as Coachella in its lineup. Most of the names in the biggest type were acts that have been seen a lot in recent years, in touring circuits and wherever else: the Black Keys, Swedish House Mafia, Bon Iver, Radiohead.

Anyway, innocence. You saw it projected onstage rather than felt by the audience, as part of the music’s artifice, in band after band with cool eyewear, retrospective yearnings and the trebly sound of Fender Jaguars and Jazzmasters: Girls, Yuck, EMA, Ximena Sariñana, M83, the Shins, Real Estate and even the R&B singer Frank Ocean, beset with sound problems, singing beautifully and moving diffidently.

It was left to Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg, on Sunday night, to work the surprises. They performed wall-to-wall hits from 10 to 20 years ago with a pile of guests: Eminem and 50 Cent; Wiz Khalifa as rap’s present; the Los Angeles rapper Kendrick Lamar (who performed “The Recipe,” a new Dr. Dre production) as its future; and, as its past, a full-body holograph of Tupac Shakur, digitally pacing the stage and appearing to ask Coachella what was up.

‘Radio and Juliet’ at Skirball Center - Review

Here’s the pitch: a ballet of Romeo and Juliet. Sure, that’s been done before, but this is contemporary, set to songs by Radiohead, sure to appeal to a youthful demographic. And get this: Juliet doesn’t kill herself. The whole love story comes through her flashbacks. This thing is stripped-down, chic, just Juliet in a corset and six men in suits without shirts. It doesn’t take up your whole evening, either. An hour and you’re out.

Radio and Juliet From left, Matjaz Marin and Tijuana Krizman of Ballet Maribor in Edward Clug's staging at the Skirball Center on Friday.

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Judging by the young crowd that filled the Skirball Center for the Performing Arts at New York University on Friday night, the choreographer Edward Clug has found a formula for selling tickets. The “Radio and Juliet” he created for the Slovenian company Ballet Maribor has been touring since 2005. It’s a hit, but more of a programming success than an artistic one.

Mr. Clug’s choreography is detailed and sharply defined. Its most distinguishing feature, however, is twitchiness. Bodily extremities flick and jerk so frequently that it seems the entire cast has a nervous disorder. Perhaps that’s by design, to illustrate modern anxiety, but it becomes silly.

In a dance to Radiohead, the twitches can be partly justified as punctuation, acknowledgment of the beat. Mr. Clug also takes a robot voice from the band’s album “OK Computer” as the excuse for a mechanical solo for Juliet, adroit but gratuitous.

Occasionally the lyrics speak to the situation (Mercutio dies to the track “Bulletproof ... I Wish I Was”), but mostly the music is there for atmosphere. It works best in the fight scenes, where the speed of Mr. Clug’s style locks into a song’s sense of contained agitation finally erupting.

As Mercutio, Christian Guerematchi steals the show. Small and dark, he’s the most fluent dancer on the stage, now slinky, now explosive. His dying twitch is sad because it means he will dance no more.

Tijuana Krizman’s Juliet isn’t Shakespeare’s great soul but a girl with some spunk. During a love duet with Romeo (the lanky, accurate Matjaz Marin), she bats at his jacket, one of several moments between them that ring true. Rather than tragic romance, Mr. Clug emphasizes the awkwardness of adolescent attraction.

Despite the framing and the gender imbalance, Mr. Clug’s reduction retains the basic outline of Shakespeare’s play. His deviations are invariably diminishments. This Romeo is passive, a mere bystander to his friend Mercutio’s death. Repeatedly, he is replaced at Juliet’s side by the other men, an odd motif that has the effect of making Juliet look like a tart. Instead of poison, there is a forbidden fruit, a ridiculous lemon. And the only upshot of Juliet’s survival is video of her moping in a bathtub, fully clothed.

A flashback of Romeo’s death is the ballet’s final scene. He just lies there while Juliet writhes through one more solo. The ending took me by surprise: That’s it? It’s over? Only in retrospect could I admire the economy with which the production, skipping forward in blackouts, raced through its material. But I should have guessed how it would end. The last thing Juliet does is twitch.

Radiohead drum tech Scott Johnson dies at Toronto Stage Collapse

Last night’s tragedy at Downsview Park in Toronto leaves everyone in shock, as crew member Scott Johnson did not survive the stage collapse.

Scott Johnson

Scott Johnson was Radiohead’s drum tech. The 33-year-old, from Doncaster in Yorkshire, died after the top portion of the stage fell in on him as he was setting up for the show. Our thoughts are with his family, friends, band and crew. 

Radiohead’s drummer Philip Selway comments on his death: “We have all been shattered by the loss of Scott Johnson, our friend and colleague. He was a lovely man, always positive, supportive and funny; a highly skilled and valued member of our great road crew. We will miss him very much. Our thoughts and love are with Scott’s family and all those close to him.”

Apart from Radiohead, Scott also worked for bands like Keane and White Lies. Ian West, Scott Johnson’s drum teacher in Doncaster, said his former pupil toured the world with famous bands, including Radiohead and Keane, he told The Telegraph: “It was a very, very big shock. He was a great student and a great drummer. He got a lucky break and made the most of it, he never looked back. He was a fantastic guy, never down, very enthusiastic. He was very thoughtful and would do anything for you, he was spot on.

Keane, who Scott worked for as well, posted a message on their website: “We lost our great friend Scott Johnson on Saturday. Scott has been part of our touring family since 2004, working as drum tech, stage manager, and studio tech, but he gave us so much more – he saw the good in everything. He was the cheerful, dependable guy you could always turn to, who lifted the spirits of everyone around him. We can’t believe he’s gone. Our thoughts are with his family and friends; Radiohead and their crew. We love you Scotty, we’ll miss you.”

Jack Brown of White Lies said on Twitter: “Devastated to learn that the man killed in the Radiohead stage collapse was drum tech Scott Johnson. Scott worked with White Lies on a show earlier in the year as my drum tech. A very talented man and a lovely guy all round. Glad to have known him. A big loss. RIP Scott.”

Geoff Barrow of Portishead and band mate of Clive Deamer, who drums with Radiohead on this tour tweeted: “Shocking to hear the passing of crew member Scott Johnson of the radiohead tour – my thoughts and condolences are with everyone involved.”

Tim Burgess of The Charlatans said: “Our thoughts are with the family of Scott Johnson – the drum tech for Radiohead who tragically died yesterday”

Watch an interview with Scott from 2009 at the V Festival below.



16 days ago by Adriaan Pels in Radiohead News | You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Bonnaroo Festival, With Radiohead, Phish and D’Angelo

MANCHESTER, Tenn. — Funk and soul held sway, if only by a plurality, at the 11th annual Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival, the four-day gathering that started on Thursday here, about 70 miles from Nashville. All three of Bonnaroo’s main-stage headliners — Radiohead, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Phish — drew on the power of rhythm, especially African-American rhythms, as organizing principle and kinetic pleasure.

The singer, songwriter and guitarist Annie Clark, known as St. Vincent, at Bonnaroo. More Photos »

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A festival fan in the wee hours of Sunday morning after the D.J. set by Skrillex. More Photos »

The festival’s most newsworthy event was the return of D’Angelo, who made a great neo-soul album in 2000 and dropped out of sight a year later. His voice and charisma intact, he was singing funk and rock songs with a band led by Ahmir Questlove Thompson of the Roots. And the must-see set on Thursday night was by Alabama Shakes, whose songs reclaim all the spirit of 1960s soul music.

This year’s Bonnaroo peaked early with a spectacular set on Friday night by Radiohead, which is more than ever a hard act to follow, especially when heard through Bonnaroo’s magnificent sound system. Radiohead made its songs jitter and crackle, with new electronic overlays and abstract funk rhythms dancing through paranoia and foreboding. Its backdrop was a two-story wall of lights, constructed from recycled water bottles, that flickered with geometric patterns as if enclosing the band within cybernetic space.

The Red Hot Chili Peppers, on Saturday night, were pure musical sinew, an unstoppable, muscle-powered rhythm section knocking out rock and funk ideas from the 1960s through the 2000s, topping them with wild guitar and jumping all over the stage. Phish, Bonnaroo’s Sunday night finale, was in its most euphoric mode, leaning on the part of its repertory with roots in blues, funk and country; the pop-country hit maker Kenny Rogers, who had performed earlier on his own and with Lionel Richie, joined Phish on the huge stage to sing “The Gambler.”

In a way, Bonnaroo 2012 was a holding action. Radiohead and Phish were returning headliners — Radiohead from 2006 and Phish from 2009 — and this year’s overall lineup did not quite equal that of previous years. But Bonnaroo is never monolithic. With more than 150 bands on five large stages, along with smaller ones scattered around its 700-acre grounds, Bonnaroo could be folky as well as funky; it also had pop, indie-rock, electronic dance music, oldies and comedy. A few performers, like Tune-Yards, did double duty, performing live soundtracks for silent films in a movie tent.

When it began, Bonnaroo featured jam bands and their sources, and that foundation remains. The audience and vendors were awash in tie dye. Reminders to recycle and other environmental messages were omnipresent; the plastic cups could be composted. Performers cheerfully, or mockingly, addressed the crowd as “hippies.” And the Bonnaroo throng — about 80,000, many camped out on the grounds — is still ready to dance to everything from hip-hop to bluegrass. It’s an untrendy crowd, gathered for a good time.

Yet the pop landscape has changed over the last decade, and Bonnaroo has adapted in its own way. While more specialized jam-band festivals have modeled themselves on Bonnaroo’s early years, the current festival’s lineup now overlaps more with those of other festivals; the Red Hot Chili Peppers, for instance, will also headline Lollapalooza in Chicago. And what originated as a once-a-year event in Tennessee is available for endless replays on YouTube.

Some of the festival’s most enthusiastic audiences shouted along with the hip-hop chants of strong newcomers — the hedonistic Danny Brown, the pugnacious Yelawolf, the comical Das Racist and the socially conscious Kendrick Lamar — as well as with more established acts like the Roots, who have always been a robust live hip-hop band, and Ludacris, who brought a band of his own. The latest rediscovery of 1960s soul also played well at Bonnaroo: not just Alabama Shakes but also young bands backing mature soul singers like Sharon Jones (with the Dap-Kings) and Charles Bradley (with the Extraordinaires).

Bonnaroo’s schedule still had plenty of room for jam bands like Phish, Dispatch and Umphrey’s McGee, who played in Saturday’s wee hours, from 2 a.m. to just before 6 a.m. The Word, an instrumental jam-band coalition, brought together the steel guitarist Robert Randolph, the keyboardist John Medeski and two members of the North Mississippi All-Stars. The groups steamed through tunes from gospel and Stevie Wonder.

A good part of the Bonnaroo crowd savored instrumental passages as well as pop hooks. The meticulous arrangements of Bon Iver, with long stretches of hushed delicacy, held thousands of people transfixed when he played the main stage. White Denim, a band that goes barreling from tricky, musicianly structures to Texas boogie, drew roars of approval.

Radiohead Stage in Toronto Collapses – Show Cancelled

The stage at Downsview Park in Toronto, Canada has collapsed, where Radiohead were set to perform tonight.
The stage at Downsview Theatre has collapsed at around 4pm. As @Zakea Tweets: “Stage collapsed at #downsview for #Radiohead So scary. So many ambulances.” See @Zakea‘s picture above.

People were not on the site when the accident happened. Doors were going to open an hour later at 5pm for the sold out show. The show has been cancelled soon after. Early reports said three people were injured, one in critical condition. Shortly after one person was pronounced dead. Another was taken to Sunnybrook Hospital in serious condition and the two others were treated for minor injuries and are released. It’s uncertain how the tragedy took place. The police are investigating at the moment. Weather conditions were good. There was only a calm wind at the park at the time. Video of the damaged stage below.

A police statement issued on Twitter said one man in his 30s was pronounced dead at the scene and a 45-year-old man was taken to a local hospital with a non-life-threatening head injury. It said two other males were treated on the scene for less serious injuries. Burrows said investigators were still unsure what caused the mishap, which was under investigation by the Ontario Ministry of Labor and the Toronto police.

Scott Johnson

UPDATE: Reports on social media name Scott Johnson as the one who did not survive the stage collapse. Scott Johnson was Radiohead’s drum tech. Our thoughts are with his family, friends, band and crew.

More on Scott Johnson here, including an interview with Scott and people close to him respond to his death, including Phil Selway.

Toronto police spokesman Sergeant Tim Burrows told Reuters that about 20 people were in the direct vicinity of the stage, conducting rehearsals and sound checks, when it gave way.

“The roof part of the stage collapsed,” Toronto Fire Services spokesman Captain Mike Strapko told Reuters. “It’s like an arch made out of round piping similar to what they use for scaffolding,” he said, adding that the structure was rigged with lighting and other equipment. “So that’s what came down and did crush the one individual.”

Dan Snaith of Caribou, who were going to open for Radiohead, tweeted: “We are profoundly saddened by what happened today. All our sympathy is with the band and crew and the families of those affected.”

At this point, it’s not clear if the band are going to reschedule the show, which was only one of the two Canadian shows of their World Tour. The band played the other Canadian show in Montreal the night before.
For now the 40,000 people can get a refund at point of sale.

Radiohead have issued the following message: “Due to unforeseen circumstances the radiohead show at downsview park tonight has been cancelled.Fans are advised not to make their way to the venue. Refunds will be made at point of purchase. Further information is to follow.”

This is the second time Radiohead have to cancel a show in Toronto. The last time was in 2003 due to a power outage when Radiohead were scheduled to play at Molson Amphitheater. At the rescheduled show at Toronto’s Skydome, which was also the last show of their North American tour, Thom Yorke stopped in the middle of Myxomatosis when a fan passed out. The band quickly resumed.

The 2003 show was rescheduled two months after. This time it might be harder. Radiohead are in the middle of their World Tour. The band move to Europe next, starting with a show in Rome on June 30th. At the moment, the band have no shows planned for August and September.

Purchasers of beer/drink tickets from the Radiohead concert can obtain refunds by bringing or mailing their beer/drink tickets to Downsview Park’s head office. More info here.



One dead, at least three more hurt as Radiohead stage collapses before the show

photo via CBC

Radiohead’s heavily anticipated set at Toronto’s Downsview Park has been cancelled after the stage collapsed, killing one and injuring at least three more. Reports from the scene vary, but sources say that the collapse happened minutes before gates were set to open to the public.

Radiohead has issued a brief statement on the collapse, advising fans not to make their way to the park. LiveNation says refunds will be available at point of purchase.

There’s no news yet on what caused the collapse, and we’re not prepared to speculate, but this is at least the third major incident of its kind to happen in the last year. We hope it’s the last.

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Radiohead announce Toronto and Montreal shows

Radiohead have announced a few other North American dates to go with their in-progress tour, and the added dates include stops in Toronto and Montreal.

On Friday, June 15, they’ll play the Bell Centre in Montreal, and on Saturday, June 16, they’ll be at Downsview park in Toronto (which is the same weekend the annual NXNE festival is in town). Caribou will be opening the Toronto show.

Tickets go on sale this Friday, March 9 at Live Nation.

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Radiohead remember drum tech killed in Toronto stage collapse

The victim of the stage collapse at Downsview Park (one that eerily echoed similar events of last summer) in Toronto this past Saturday has been named as Radiohead drum technician Scott Johnson.

In a post simply titled “Scott,” the band mourned their colleague with the following note on their website:

“We have all been shattered by the loss of Scott Johnson, our friend and colleague. He was a lovely man, always positive, supportive and funny; a highly skilled and valued member of our great road crew. We will miss him very much. Our thoughts and love are with Scott’s family and all those close to him.”

Though it was rumoured the band might instead join the Flaming Lips for their free outdoor show downtown in Toronto on the same night, Toronto Police worked to squash the incorrect information on Twitter. Flaming Lips sent their sympathy to Radiohead and played a rendition of “Knives Out” in tribute.

The cause of the collapse is still being investigated.

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Flaming Lips play Knives Out in Toronto, dedicated to the Radiohead family

The Flaming Lips were scheduled to play in Toronto on the same day as Radiohead in Toronto. The band covered Knives Out in their honour.

Frontman Wayne Coyne send out a lot of tweets before the tragedy at Downsview Park in Toronto, where Radiohead drum technician Scott Johnson lost his life. After the incident Wayne Coyne paid respect to Radiohead and those who got hurt. As you know, the Radiohead show was cancelled, the Flaming Lips show still happened at Dundas Square.

The band played their cover of Knives Out for the Radiohead family. “This unthinkable thing that happened today, we can’t all help but be affected by it. Peace be with their hearts tonight. This has been a pretty powerful day. This goes out to the Radiohead family.”



16 days ago by Adriaan Pels in Radiohead News | You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Radiohead live in Camden – Live Report

Tonight at the Susquehanna Bank Center in Camden, New Jersey, Radiohead play their final US show for the foreseeable future (the leg ends later this week with two shows in Canada). Radiohead will take the stage around 8:45pm after Caribou’s opening set.

We’ll be updating this post with soundcheck info/live stream info and, of course, the setlist when the show begins. And, as always, you can also follow our @Radioheadlive twitter account for all your live setlist needs.

Two possible live streams tonight: here and here.

And we’re off…with no red pants.

Setlist
01 Bloom
02 There There
03 Kid A
04 Morning Mr Magpie
05 The Gloaming
06 Separator
07 Lucky
08 Like Spinning Plates
09 Identikit
10 15 Step
11 Nude
12 Lotus Flower
13 Paranoid Android
14 Feral
15 Little By Little
16 Idioteque
——
17 Give Up The Ghost
18 Staircase
19 I Might Be Wrong
20 Bodysnatchers
——
21 House Of Cards
22 Reckoner
23 True Love Waits/Everything In Its Right Place

And that’s it for tonight. On to Canada to wrap up the third leg of the tour.



New Radiohead Album To Start Out Online

It's the morning after the Grammy Awards, when the recording industry is still recovering from after-parties, after-after-parties and any pathogenic bacteria it might have picked up from Lady Gaga's egg, so who would expect there to be any music news before Justin Bieber wakes up?

Radiohead, that's who. That nonconformist British band opted to wait until immediately after the Grammys (and, in Britain, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts Awards) to announce that its next album, ''The King of Limbs,'' will be available as a digital download on Saturday before its physical release in May.

But unlike its last album, ''In Rainbows,'' for which Radiohead allowed online customers to pay what they wished (if they wished to pay anything at all), ''The King of Limbs'' will not be sold at such flexible prices. On its Web site for the new album, thekingoflimbs.com, the band said a digital version can be bought in advance for $9 (for MP3 format) or $14 (for WAV format).

Radiohead is also offering what it calls a ''newspaper album'' release of ''The King of Limbs'' (a metaphor that was lost on at least one newspaper employee) which includes two 10-inch vinyl records and a CD, as well as ''many large sheets of artwork, 625 tiny pieces of artwork and a full-color piece of oxo-degradable plastic to hold it all together.'' This release is sold for $48 (for MP3 digital files) or $53 (for WAV), and will be shipped on May 9, the band said.

This is a more complete version of the story than the one that appeared in print.

PHOTO (PHOTOGRAPH BY IRIS SCHNEIDER FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES)

Top 5 Hip Hop Releases: April

Each month, tons of new music from many taste-spanning genres is released into a fast-consuming, unforgiving market; it can be tough to get a handle on what’s new before it’s on to the next. In an attempt to highlight the standout releases, at the end of each month, AUX staff re-cap the month in Punk, Metal, Indie/Pop/Rock, Hip Hop, Electronic, and Pop with the top five releases in each. Consider it your cheat sheet for year-end lists.

Quakers coverSo, the guy from Portishead decided he wanted to make a hip hop album and this is it. The only question going into this project were whether the raps would step up to the plate to match what was sure to be, and is, some great beats. The answer is a resounding yes, as the collective doesn’t lean too heavily on any one rapper and thrives on flashes of excellence from over a score of separate acts. The 41-track monster of an album has loads of replay value which might come in handy considering the gaps of time Geoff Barrow and co. likes to wait between releases.

Key track: “Fitta Happier” with Guilty Simpson and M.E.D., an insane Radiohead flip that pulls a sample from an adaptation by the University of Arizona’s marching band. (By the way, I thought Drumline was pretty cool before I watched this.)

Money Store coverThe idea that Death Grips might be experimental hip hop is absurd. This is an example the pure raw unabashed hip hop; a bunch of dudes coming together using any sound or style to move the crowd, by any means necessary. Listening to Death Grips how you should might destroy your favourite speakers but it’ll be worth it.

Key track: “System Blower”, loud please.

Pluto coverFuture’s guest appearance on 2011's “Racks” blazed a path for the self-aware knucklehead to start actually stacking it up just like he says he does on that song. After a few mixtapes, here comes his album which features some of the popular songs. It’s a bit of a safe release but these anthems still boom, regardless of their age. Sprinkling them in along with the new ones makes this a perfect place to start for those unfamiliar with the mixtapes.

Key tracks: The recklessly raucous new single “Same Damn Time” and the already classic “Tony Montana” featuring Drake.

Savage Journey To The American Dream coverOne of the most impressive things about Stalley’s releases so far are the tight themes that hold them together. Stalley does a perfectly disjointed homage to Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear & Loathing In Las Vegas as he tells a parallel story about his journey as a musician. He wins again with a set of lavishly-produced instrumentals as the back drop to paint his narrative upon. The concept mixtape is a fairly popular practice as they’re usually recorded in a briefer time period which allows the artists to stay in the same headspace. It’s a shame that this doesn’t carry over to albums more often.

Key track: “Hammers & Vogues” on which Stalley repays Curren$y for his induction on 2010's Pilot Talk.

Root Stimulation coverThis PWYC release comes with some interesting tiered packages to reward those that spend more on the album. The $10,000 package comes with an opportunity to executive produce an EP with Del, barring artistic differences of course. Let’s face it, this is super weird but it’s great to see Del still around making great music. He’s doing what he has to do to keep it coming.

Key track: Enjoy Del’s classic smooth flow on “Up Early”

Surprises, disappointments and tracks/albums to watch for next month

Surprise of the month: Kendrick Lamar “The Recipe” featuring Dr. Dre

Dr. Dre has been continuously fucking up for the last five years but Kendrick Lamar gives him a hand (with a pen in it) here to a much better result. “The Recipe” is due to be one of the most successful rap tracks of the year, especially as we move into the summer months when the whole continent can bask in the California sunshine that is this track. As far as AUX is concerned Kendrick is already at the top of the game, so it’s we’re actually a bit freaked out as to where this sure-shot hit will take him. Dre better not fuck this one up.

Disappointments: Diggy – Unexpected Arrival

This squeaky clean glossy release might play to the pre-teen female demographic it was recorded for but Diggy Simmons is ready to make a real album. Dude can rap. Unfortunately, this doesn’t sit at the forefront of his official debut. The laid-back R&B approach taken with the majority of the tracks don’t align with vivacious passion a 17-year-old kid like Diggy should be able to deliver. While comparisons to his father, Reverend Run, aren’t really fair, with almost 3 decades between their respective debuts, it would do Diggy well to follow in his dad’s footsteps and find some personality and energy. He should be fine though, time is on his side. Hopefully this generic batch of radio-friendly ditties can be forgotten when he decides to realize his potential.

Out next month: El-P releases a pair of projects, one, his first album in 5 years, the other, a Killer Mike record completely produced by him.

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