After giving them DM’s album of the year award last year, it’s safe to say that this isn’t going to be a negative review…although it certainly isn’t quite perfect with the night splitting itself into three distinct parts. The night began with a solitary support act, Bats for Lashes. Musically she was fine, fans of her excellent album last year all enjoyed it. But that was it, little more could be said. She was a tiny speck on a distant stage to most and doing little for the crowd herself. And presumably as part of Radiohead’s push to cutback carbon emissions there wasn’t even a screen to show what was going on. It was good to listen to, but far from awe-inspiring.

Things continued in a similar vein as Radiohead came on, opening with Reckoner. It was fine, but it didn’t have a great impact. The lights were allowed on, but the bright clear skies took away most of the impact and the already small screens being divided four ways most of the time didn’t do much either. Planes filled the clear sky, gently mocking the choice of more energy efficient lights and the decision to turn the screens off between songs. End of Part 1.

It’s hard to quite workout where Part 2 began. 15 Step made a better start to the night than Reckoner did, but didn’t wipe away the slight doubts about the gig that were forming. Even an excellent version of There There didn’t stop people taking their eyes off the stage when two planes passed relatively close-by each other. But somewhere, certainly before a marvellous pairing of Myxamatosis and National Anthem, doubts were put to rest. It took longer than it should, but Radiohead had managed to capture the vast majority of their audience.

By the time the first encore came around, things were flowing nicely. The band might not love playing The Bends, but their fans like to hear it. Bangers and Mash might not be as well-known but it still seemed to go down well. And the second best pairing of the night, My Iron Lung and Karma Police were both great, with the former played with much more passion than you might expect after a slightly disinterested version of The Bends.

The band file off the stage again having given Part 2 a lovely send-off. When they come back on for the second encore, they start the final part of the night.

Go Slowly isn’t their best known song and it certainly isn’t their biggest, loudest one either. But despite the wait between the songs felt like it followed Karma Police extremely well and sounded great. But compared to the final two it might as well not have existed. 2+2=5 is a great track at the best of times and played in front of a crowd eager to clap and stamp along with the build-up made it even better with Radiohead responding by thrashing through it. But compared to the final track it might as well not have existed and that is really, really saying something.

In my opinion, Paranoid Android is not only one of the best Radiohead songs it is one of the best songs ever. And it was better than even I expected. Even the crowd managed to excel itself each seeming to choose a different vocal track highlight and sing along with, making it seem a million miles from hearing it before even though Radiohead themselves didn’t dodge too far from the script. And the lights…the lights! They’d been looking good since the sun started to dip, but in front of the dark night sky and allowed to use bright greens, pinks and their full power it looked amazing. And did I mention it sounded great?

I genuinely don’t think I am ever going to enjoy a single song at a gig as much as that ever again.

Fantastic.

5/5

Illustration by MAp