Colin Greenwood says Thom Yorke has started on a solo album

Thom Yorke has started work on a solo album, Colin Greenwood tells The Guide, an Australian newspaper, in an interview published on 30 April. He spoke from Japan, where he had brought homework on tour, marking poems for a competition. His wife, the writer Molly McGrann, rang while they talked.

Of “Creep” he says the band were never aiming for a hit and it happened by accident. The backlash began with Pablo Honey, when critics called them one-hit wonders, and he never believed it.

He calls the 1997-98 OK Computer tour very distressing, because Yorke played each night with a faraway look and did not want to be there, and nobody wants to work alongside someone who would rather be elsewhere. He won't paint it all as misery, though. There were beach barbecues, go-karting and the sea, and he still counts it a privilege.

Kid A and Amnesiac were hard records to make after OK Computer. I think Kid A is the best album we've recorded.¹

Yorke and Rachel Owen now have a son, Noah, and Greenwood says the whole band have become parentally inclined. He bristles at being called a 30-something millionaire. If they played for money, he says, they would tour longer, charge more, make their own merchandise and sign with somebody else.

Hail to the Thief was recorded quickly, live and in a positive atmosphere, and he thinks it begins a new cycle for Radiohead. Greenwood has no idea what the next record will sound like, and says each member has his own agenda for the band. His would be for them to catch something of their live energy.

I would like to see it go from acoustic to hard techno, with everything in the middle.

Colin Greenwood¹