Radiohead play four songs new to the tour in Charlotte

Radiohead played 24 songs to a sold-out Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre in Charlotte, North Carolina, on Friday night, and Thom Yorke gave the crowd fair warning before “Paranoid Android” in the second encore. This is a nasty little bastard, this one… Hope you like it.¹

It was the fourth night of the North American tour, after West Palm Beach, Tampa and Atlanta, and four songs had their first outing of the run: “Myxomatosis”, “Go Slowly”, “Planet Telex” and “Sail to the Moon”, which, according to the setlist notes, Yorke dedicated to the people of North Carolina. Eight of the ten In Rainbows songs were played; “Faust Arp” and “Jigsaw Falling Into Place” sat this one out.

Jeff Hahne, music editor of Creative Loafing Charlotte, watched Yorke do nearly all the moving while the rest of the band mostly stood still. Yorke knocked his microphone stand over in “Myxomatosis”, went to a keyboard for “Morning Bell” and sat down at a second, smaller drum kit for “Bangers + Mash”.

The stage was hung with long tubes of light that looked like falling rain, and they were at their height in “Planet Telex”. Hahne rates it the best light show he has seen since Pink Floyd.

Jonny Greenwood put up photographs from Charlotte on Dead Air Space, the band's blog, the next day.

Setlist, Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre, Charlotte, 9 May 2008