Radiohead end Old Trafford cricket ground with a surprise “Lucky”

Radiohead played Old Trafford cricket ground on 29 June, and after two encores came back for a third that was not on the setlist, “Lucky”. The night had opened with “15 Step”.

Earlier on the tour, reviewers had been cool about sets heavy on the recent records and light on The Bends and OK Computer, and the band changed course at their second Victoria Park show in London. Manchester got the result, and the Manchester Evening News reviewer, who called the night a balanced triumph, heard an early “Airbag”, then “No Surprises”, “Fake Plastic Trees”, “Paranoid Android” and “Karma Police”, which closed the first encore. The reviewer's highlights were “2 + 2 = 5”, “The National Anthem” and an organ-heavy “Everything In Its Right Place”.

The reviewer had doubted that the quiet piano songs from In Rainbows would carry outdoors, and was proved wrong. Close-ups on the big screens, split four ways, made “Videotape”, “Nude” and “Weird Fishes/Arpeggi” work, apart from some chatter over Thom Yorke's vocal. Light tubes changed colour with the songs and finished in a rainbow.

Parents had brought their children, and a woman the reviewer put at about 80 made for the mosh pit during “Idioteque”.