Radiohead put out “My Iron Lung” with six new songs behind it

Parlophone released “My Iron Lung” on Monday 26 September, on two CDs, a numbered twelve-inch and a cassette. Thom Yorke told Melody Maker on the eve of release that Radio 1 had already judged it too raucous. I was terrified that the week we released it we'd find out someone awful was releasing a album with the same name!⁶

Each CD has the title track and three new songs that are not on the other, seven songs in all, which Music Week's preview thought an odd way to trail an album. The twelve-inch and the tape carry four songs each. The EP went into the UK singles chart at number 24. The second album, produced by Leckie, is due in February.

The title track is not a studio take. After months working on it with John Leckie, NME reported, Leckie decided the band's performance at the London Astoria on 27 May was the one to use. The sleeve credits Leckie as producer and Nigel Godrich as an engineer, and “Permanent Daylight” is produced by Godrich and Radiohead, so this is the first Radiohead record with Godrich's name on it. It is also Stanley Donwood's first Radiohead sleeve, credited to him and The White Chocolate Farm: a television picture of legs and a limousine, in NME's description, reworked four video generations down.

Yorke said the song was aimed at certain members of certain audiences rather than at fame. The iron lung came from a photograph he owned; he was often ill as a child, and stress still makes him ill. Where “Creep” was sung in the first person, this one says “we”. I've started using 'we' all the time because I'm sick of projecting things onto myself⁶

Asked whether “My Iron Lung” was pure In Utero, Jonny Greenwood and Ed O'Brien said neither of them owned the record. Jonny's case is that Nirvana's melodies are modal and lean on the chorus, Yorke's don't, and the noise on this one is rationed. We're quite wary of noise. It's the only thing on the album where it does do that.⁶

My Iron Lung, UK formats