Thom Yorke turns down NME's Mott The Hoople comparison

Stuart Bailie casts Radiohead in NME as this generation's Mott The Hoople, with Suede's Brett Anderson as its Bowie, and Thom Yorke will have none of it. They might as well record the Bowie cover straight away, he jokes, and he denies any wish to define what rock'n'roll is.

Bailie hears the new single, “Anyone Can Play Guitar”, as unable to decide whether rock is liberating art or a racket for chancers.

The song is an attack on people who think that growing their hair long and wearing tight leather trousers constitutes being a rock star – and God, it doesn't.

Thom Yorke¹

That image he calls a lazy marketing shortcut. Being in a band is still, for him, the best thing a person can do with a life, like running away to join the circus, one last go at something different before giving in and getting a job. “Pop Is Dead”, which he calls really vitriolic, closes the live show, and he usually dedicates it to Freddie Mercury.

Bailie counts about 100 gigs in 1992. At ULU in January the students sang along even to the B-sides, but the show he remembers best was in a YMCA hall in Chelmsford, where one fan stood at the front all night waiting for “Creep”.