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Jonny Greenwood names two unreleased songs he wants Radiohead to finish

written up for the archive

Jonny Greenwood answers readers' questions in Uncut's December issue, on sale on Tuesday 23 October, and he has two songs in mind when he is asked whether Radiohead will ever release any of their well-known unreleased ones: “Burn the Witch” and “Present Tense”.

We have a long history of writing songs and having them hang around unrecorded for years.

Jonny Greenwood1

He hopes the band will get round to some of them, especially 'Burn The Witch' and 'Present Tense', which could be great, if we get the arrangements sorted out1. The magazine asked for the questions in September, and others take in why he can't write proper songs, his work as a film composer, and the foxes that went after his chickens.

“Present Tense” was first heard when Thom Yorke played it alone at Latitude in July 2009.

“Burn the Witch” dates from the Kid A sessions. Its title is printed in the artwork of the Hail to the Thief booklet, and in September 2005 Yorke wrote on Dead Air Space, the band's blog, that it was one of the songs Greenwood had to orchestrate. Yorke has played a few bars of it on stage, at the piano in Berkeley in June 2006 and again in Maryland Heights in May 2008, saying the band would do it properly when they had the orchestra.

sources · 2 & notes

archivist’s note

The quotes come from Uncut's online preview of the printed interview in its December 2012 issue.

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