The band · the five
Phil Selway
Drums · percussion
Drums, and a Samaritans volunteer since his student days.
- Plays
- Drums, percussion, backing vocals
- Born
- 23 May 1967 · Abingdon-on-Thames
- In the band since
- 1985, a founder of On a Friday
photo
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Philip James Selway is the oldest of the five, a couple of years above Thom and Colin at Abingdon. He studied English and history at Liverpool Polytechnic, and has drummed for On a Friday and then Radiohead almost without a break since the mid-1980s.
He plays for the song and stays out of its way, at home in odd time signatures, from the drive of “There There” to the broken-up rhythms of the later records. He sings backing harmonies too. The 2012 tour, with Clive Deamer on a second kit beside him, is what he credits with reviving his interest in the drums.
He trained as a Samaritans listening volunteer while a student in Liverpool, took calls for seventeen years and has since been an ambassador for the charity. He is an ambassador for Independent Venue Week too, which backs the small rooms bands start out in.
Beyond Radiohead
He has made three solo albums, Familial (2010), Weatherhouse (2014) and Strange Dance (2023). He meant to drum on the last one, and handed the kit to Valentina Magaletti once the sessions began because he did not feel match fit. He has also scored the films Let Me Go (2017) and Carmilla (2019), and Rambert commissioned music from him for a Merce Cunningham Event.
His songs are in Songs, his nights on stage in the live archive. The nights he has played without the band are listed apart.