Song · Pablo Honey era (1992–93)
Banana Co.
An On a Friday song that Radiohead played for six years and never put on a studio album.
feb 1993
signal radio
The version most people heard first was acoustic, recorded at Signal Radio in Cheshire on 11 February 1993 and put out that spring as a B-side to “Pop Is Dead”. The sleeve credits it as “recorded live courtesy of Craig Cash”. Mac Randall called it Beatlesque. The words go after the multinationals and what they do to the places they move into, with the fruit company of the title standing in for all of them.
1993–98
in the set
Nine days after the radio session the band played it at the Venue in Oxford, and that year it was in the set on forty-four nights. In Paris in April 1996 it closed the night at La Cigale, and when the OK Computer tour picked it up again in Cleveland in August 1997, more than a year after the Zodiac in Oxford, it stayed in until Calgary the following April.
1993–96
the studio version
They cut a fuller version, with electric guitars, at Courtyard in March 1993 and thought about it for The Bends. It missed the record. In 1995 the band gave it to an album by the coalition against the Criminal Justice Bill, and in January 1996 it was a B-side for the second time, on the first CD of the “Street Spirit (Fade Out)” single, nearly three years after the first.
on stage
Live, World Beat Center, San Diego, 16/07/1993.· Elias Junewatch on youtube →
the record(1)
on stage(3)
Live history
| Times played | 100 shows |
|---|---|
| Live debut | Saturday 20 February 1993 · Oxford |
| Last played | Wednesday 8 April 1998 · Calgary |
| Closed the night | 5 times |
Nights played include broadcasts; opened and closed count gigs only. A cancelled night has no setlist. All setlist stats →
Tabs (1)
sources5
- The site's own catalogue note, based on Drowned in Sound and fan archives.
- Mac Randall, Exit Music: The Radiohead Story.
- The 2003 treefingers.com lyric page (
_legacy/lyrics/songs/banana_co..txt), for the electric guitars. - This site's news stories on the “Pop Is Dead” single (1993), the “High and Dry” single announcement (1995), the La Cigale night in Radiohead World Service (1996) and the “Street Spirit (Fade Out)” single, from Music Week's listing of 20 January 1996, for the sleeve credit, the benefit album and the formats.
- The site's live archive, for every date.