Radiohead's “Creep” comes close to Single of the Week in both weeklies

“Creep”, Radiohead's new single, came out on Parlophone on 21 September, and both weekly music papers have come within a whisker of making it Single of the Week without quite doing it.

It is the band's first record since Drill in May, “Creep” backed by three more songs on CD, twelve-inch and cassette. Sean Slade and Paul Q. Kolderie, the Boston production team, produced the title track at Chipping Norton Recording Studios in Oxfordshire. The sleeve, designed by Icon, carries a Steve Gullick photograph and a Maurice Burns painting called Craigavon Under Age Drinkers Rule.

Melody Maker got there first, with an unsigned review in its 19 September issue that calls the record the band's second EP. The title track alone, it says, would have shared first prize, but the other side lets it down badly. The reviewer hears a sparse shuffle and a whispered vocal before two huge bursts of guitar crash in, and puts Radiohead beside Suede for brashness and knowing themselves.

NME reviewed it this week, on a singles page hosted by Andrew Collins with the Irish comedian Sean Hughes as guest. Hughes finds it radio-friendly and, for a second single, excellent, but wonders how much the band mean what they sing if they will take a word out for the record company. He wants it angrier, with the word put back. Collins says it would have been Single of the Week had Hughes not been in charge, and suggests that a band who let EMI edit out their swearing for money should change their name to Radioedit.

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