On film · concert film · 2012
Austin City Limits: Radiohead
The programme seldom gives one act its whole hour, and it gave Radiohead one to open its 38th season.
2012
hello, Austin
Austin City Limits, the longest-running music series on American television, announced in December 2011 that Radiohead would tape an episode, their first. They played it on Tuesday 6 March 2012 at ACL Live at the Moody Theater, the programme's home since 2011, the night before an arena show across town at the Frank Erwin Center.
Hi, we're Radiohead, we're pleased to meet you.
Thom Yorke · Austin City Limits, March 2012
About 2,000 people saw a 90-minute set, with two drum kits on the stage, Clive Deamer's beside Phil Selway's. Doug Freeman of The Austin Chronicle found the room intimate, but thought the programme's standard lighting and a quieter mix than the arena got the next night held the performance back.
2012
the false start
Most of the set was The King of Limbs and what came after it. “Identikit” was not yet released, and “The Amazing Sounds of Orgy”, a B-side from the Amnesiac years, had been played live for the first time the night before, in Dallas. Then “Reckoner” came apart about a minute and three-quarters in, and the band stopped and started it again.
The encore opened with “Skirting on the Surface”, a song Yorke had played on his own in Los Angeles in 2009 and the full band only once before, in Dallas. After the taping Terry Lickona, the programme's executive producer, sat down with Yorke and Ed O'Brien to talk about the record.
2012
the hour on PBS
The episode opened the 38th season on 6 October 2012, the same night Radiohead began their British arena dates in Manchester. It ran to 11 songs. “Little by Little”, “The Gloaming”, “Lotus Flower”, “Weird Fishes/Arpeggi”, “Reckoner” and “Skirting on the Surface” were left out, though a clip of “Lotus Flower” had already gone out in April.
The film here is not the broadcast. A fan posted the whole taping to YouTube on 6 April 2012, six months before PBS showed its hour, coming in partway through “Bloom” and keeping the false start. It also keeps the encore PBS cut, and with it a song Radiohead never released. Yorke and Jonny Greenwood put “Skirting on the Surface” out ten years later with The Smile, spelt “Skrting on the Surface”.
a fan's copy
Austin City Limits: Radiohead· RadioBoot Headwatch on youtube →
sources10
- RadioBoot Head, “Radiohead ACL Live @ Moody Theatre”, YouTube, 6 April 2012, youtube.com (the whole taping, posted on 6 April 2012, the running order, “Bloom” cutting in, the false start, the running time)
- PBS and KLRU, “Radiohead launches Austin City Limits new season”, press release, 28 September 2012, cm-pressroom.pbs.org (Yorke's greeting, the full hour, the longest-running music series, the Moody Theater as home since 2011, the 11 songs broadcast, 6 October)
- KPBS, “Austin City Limits: Radiohead”, 11 October 2012, kpbs.org (the taping date, Lickona's interview with Yorke and O'Brien)
- Alex Young, “Radiohead to appear on Austin City Limits”, Consequence of Sound, 14 December 2011, consequence.net (the announcement)
- Doug Freeman, “Radiohead week: existential crisis?”, The Austin Chronicle, 8 March 2012, austinchronicle.com (about 2,000 people, 90 minutes, the intimate room, the lighting and the mix)
- Glen Boyd, “Radiohead on Austin City Limits”, Blogcritics, 18 October 2012, blogcritics.org (two drummers, Selway and Deamer)
- Ted Chase, “Radiohead: live on ACL”, QRO, 10 March 2012, qromag.com (two drum kits on stage)
- SPIN, “Sneak preview: Radiohead's 'Austin City Limits' set”, 20 April 2012, spinmagazine.com (the “Lotus Flower” clip)
- Uncut, “Watch Radiohead perform on American television”, 8 October 2012, uncut.co.uk (Manchester the same night)
- This site's show pages for Dallas, the taping and the Frank Erwin Center (the debut of “The Amazing Sounds of Orgy”, the restarted “Reckoner”), and the song page for “Skirting on the Surface” (Los Angeles in 2009, Dallas, the Smile)