Ed O'Brien recalls the Bends sessions Radiohead threw away

Ed O'Brien says Radiohead had 22 songs ready for The Bends, and still had to scrap their first attempt at recording them. He was talking to Miami New Times by phone from England, before the band's first American night supporting R.E.M., at Miami Arena on Friday.

We had 22 amazing songs, but the first batch of recordings was dreadful, so we had to abandon it and go out on tour, which allowed us to reaffirm our faith in the songs and our faith as a band

Ed O'Brien¹

He measures the change from Pablo Honey, made in three weeks, in guitars. The debut would stack eight or nine guitar tracks on a song; the new album has two or three, with piano, violin and cello brought in. He suspects plenty of people expected more guitar frenzy. The band spent 1994 questioning everything, he says, under pressure to follow “Creep” straight away.

It's very weird to go and immediately record another album, with everyone wanting 'Creep, Part Two' or whatever

Ed O'Brien¹

The arenas will be new to a band who learned their trade in clubs. Before America there were six European shows with R.E.M., and a night in Denmark on a bill with Neil Young, where Pearl Jam's Stone Gossard came up to ask why they had left “Planet Telex” out of the set.