Thom Yorke nearly walked off at Glastonbury 1997, he tells 6 Music

Thom Yorke came close to walking off stage in the middle of Radiohead's headline set at Glastonbury in 1997. He tells the story to Matt Everitt on BBC 6 Music's The First Time, an hour in which a guest tells their life through the music they choose. At one point I just went over to Ed. I tapped him on the shoulder and said, 'I'm off mate, see you later.'³ Ed O'Brien talked him round. He turned around and went, 'If you do, you'll probably live the rest of your life regretting it.'³ Yorke agreed.

That set, on 28 June, 12 days after OK Computer came out in Britain, was dogged by technical trouble. In the encore Yorke told the crowd the speakers had been blowing up and thanked them for their patience. He had not wanted to play it at all. He had burnt himself out and told a planning meeting he could not do it. The break he needed did not come for more than another year, by which time he was close to catatonic. Q has since named it the best gig of all time. Radiohead go back to headline the Pyramid Stage for the third time on 23 June.

His notebooks from the OK Computer years, which he thought lost until they turned up in a box at the band's office, hold 30 or 40 versions of the “Paranoid Android” lyrics. He spent days on them, changing about five words at a time, like a meditation. They will be reproduced in the limited box set of OKNOTOK 1997 2017, the OK Computer reissue. Reading them again was like making friends with whoever that person was.

One of his favourite early memories is a four-track demo he made with Phil Selway at Selway's house, round the corner from school, called “Lock the Door”. Yorke says it was good, it exists, and he is still trying to find it. He tells the band's beginnings as a recruitment drive in his own head. He felt sorry for Colin Greenwood playing bass on a very short lead, knew Colin's younger brother Jonny was a genius, had heard of a great older drummer, and saw O'Brien walking around as if he were in the Smiths.

For “No Surprises” he wanted the band to sound as if they had taken Mogadon. We tried to play it as slow as we could, but it was never slow enough, because we weren't on Mogadon.¹ They took an earlier version and slowed it right down.

Asked whether he is an optimist, Yorke answered with a message for someone he did not name, who would be impeached shortly, was no leader and could not sustain this. Pitchfork read it as aimed at Donald Trump and Theresa May.

He was always the nutter in the band, he says, but is less of a nightmare now. I decided I needed to enjoy my work before it killed me.²