On film · video collection · 1998
7 Television Commercials
Seven promo films from The Bends and OK Computer on one tape, with Jonathan Glazer the only director who got two.
1998
seven films on a tape
Parlophone put out 7 Television Commercials on video in May 1998, while OK Computer was still selling and the band were heading for America with Spiritualized. It holds seven of their promo films from The Bends and OK Computer, and nothing else. It was their first video since Live at the Astoria.
Dilly Gent, who looked after Radiohead's videos for years, commissioned all seven, and the list shows how far apart her choices could be. Magnus Carlsson's “Paranoid Android” is a cartoon. Jonathan Glazer made “Street Spirit” and “Karma Police”, the only director with two. Grant Gee's “No Surprises” is the helmet that fills with water, and Jamie Thraves's “Just” is the man lying on the pavement who will not say why. The “High and Dry” is the American one, set in a roadside diner, which Capitol commissioned, rather than the British video. Stanley Donwood and The White Chocolate Farm, Thom Yorke's name for himself as an artist, did the sleeve.
2003
the DVD
The DVD came out in August 2003, in Britain on the 4th and in America the next day, and a Japanese edition followed in November with a booklet of the lyrics in Japanese that no other edition had. Christian Hoard gave it two stars out of four in Rolling Stone. He asked why there were only seven, with nothing else on the disc.
Five years later EMI put all seven on The Best Of DVD, with the rest of the band's videos to 2003. Each of the seven is in the Radiohead Public Library now, filed under its record, except that the library's “High and Dry” is the British video.
a fan's copy
7 Television Commercials· Radiohead Concertswatch on youtube →
sources7
- Discogs, 7 Television Commercials, EU DVD, sleeve credits, discogs.com (the running order, the directors, Dilly Gent's credit, the sleeve, 34 minutes)
- NME, “Radiohead fans: set your videos to 'play' in April”, 1998, nme.com (the collection announced, the tour with Spiritualized)
- Wikipedia, “7 Television Commercials”, en.wikipedia.org (the release dates of the tape and the DVD, the American “High and Dry”)
- Christian Hoard, “Radiohead: 7 Television Commercials”, Rolling Stone, 11 September 2003, web.archive.org (two stars, the complaint about seven)
- Discogs, The Best Of, EU DVD, discogs.com (all seven on it)
- Radiohead Public Library, radiohead.com (the videos filed under their records)
- This site's stories of March 1998, August 2003 and October 2003 (the announcement, the DVD in August, the Japanese edition)