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Radiohead try out 12 new songs over three nights in Lisbon
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Photo: Madchester at English Wikipedia · Public domain · Wikimedia CommonsRadiohead opened their first night at the Coliseu dos Recreios in Lisbon on 22 July with eight songs they had never played live, and on the very first of them, “There There”, Ed O'Brien and Jonny Greenwood left their guitars to play drums.
These are the band's first concerts since Yokohama in October 2001. The run, announced in March, is a chance to try songs that may go on the next album, due next year, in front of an audience. After Lisbon it goes on to Porto, San Sebastian, the Benicassim festival on 3 August and Salamanca, where it ends on 7 August. A spokesperson says there are no plans to tour North America this year.
The first night came in two halves, the eight new songs and then, after an interval, a set of known ones. Thom Yorke played organ on several of the new songs and joked from the stage that he could not tell the crowd what they were called. NME.COM's reporter found them more immediate and melodic than anything on Kid A or Amnesiac, and the band in good humour. The first encore opened with “Lift”, a song the band have never released and had not played since 1996, slowed down and reworked, with no backing vocal from O'Brien.
By the next day recordings of the show were going round fan sites as MP3s; Radiohead are one of few big rock bands that let fans trade their concerts. I hear they're a bit rough-sounding. A good thing possibly (smudges the songs which are still a little out of focus)
3, Greenwood wrote on the band's website on 23 July.
The second night dropped the interval but still put the new songs first, and added three more: “A Wolf at the Door”, “Sit Down. Stand Up.” and, in the encore, “Go to Sleep”. On the third the new songs were mixed in among the old, and “Where I End and You Begin” made its first appearance in the first encore, the 12th song in three nights to be played live for the first time.
Setlists, Coliseu dos Recreios, Lisbon, 22 to 24 July 2002
| # | 22 July | 23 July | 24 July |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | There There (first time) | There There | There There |
| 2 | Scatterbrain (first time) | Scatterbrain | A Punchup at a Wedding |
| 3 | Up on the Ladder (first time) | Sail to the Moon | Myxomatosis |
| 4 | We Suck Young Blood (first time) | A Wolf at the Door (first time) | We Suck Young Blood |
| 5 | I Will (first time) | Myxomatosis | Go to Sleep |
| 6 | Sail to the Moon (first time) | A Punchup at a Wedding | I Will |
| 7 | Myxomatosis (first time) | Sit Down. Stand Up. (first time) | Sit Down. Stand Up. |
| 8 | A Punchup at a Wedding (first time) | Lucky | I Might Be Wrong |
| 9 | I Might Be Wrong (second set) | Karma Police | Morning Bell |
| 10 | Morning Bell | I Might Be Wrong | Just |
| 11 | Karma Police | Morning Bell | Exit Music (for a Film) |
| 12 | You and Whose Army? | Exit Music (for a Film) | Dollars and Cents |
| 13 | No Surprises | Talk Show Host | The National Anthem |
| 14 | Dollars and Cents | My Iron Lung | Lucky |
| 15 | The National Anthem | Pyramid Song | Paranoid Android |
| 16 | Climbing Up the Walls | Idioteque | Idioteque |
| 17 | Pyramid Song | Everything in Its Right Place | Everything in Its Right Place |
| 18 | Airbag | The National Anthem (encore) | You and Whose Army? (encore) |
| 19 | Paranoid Android | Fake Plastic Trees | Talk Show Host |
| 20 | Idioteque | Go to Sleep (first time) | Where I End and You Begin (first time) |
| 21 | Everything in Its Right Place | How to Disappear Completely | Pyramid Song |
| 22 | Lift (encore, first time since 1996) | We Suck Young Blood (second encore) | Sail to the Moon (second encore) |
| 23 | Street Spirit (Fade Out) | Street Spirit (Fade Out) | Karma Police |
| 24 | The Bends | – | – |
| 25 | How to Disappear Completely | – | – |
the night
Coliseu dos Recreios, Lisbon, 24 July 2002· joaowatch on youtube →