Song · Kid A / Amnesiac era (2000–01)
Follow Me Around
A song fans campaigned for on its own website, twenty-three years between the soundcheck on film and the official release.
Kid A Mnesia (KID AMNESIAE)album- 2021released
- 5:19length
1998
seen in a documentary
It first reached the public as a fragment: Yorke playing it at a soundcheck in Meeting People Is Easy. Solo acoustic, a big chorus, and words about being watched. Early versions named Tony Blair; the one eventually released names Margaret Thatcher.
2000–01
recorded, then shelved
They recorded it during the joint Kid A and Amnesiac sessions, where it never stood a chance. O'Brien's diary from that period records the band deliberately looking for new approaches rather than “fall into old habits”, and this was very much an old habit: a man and a guitar, in the middle of the most electronic records they ever made.
After they played it in Toronto in 2000, fans built a website demanding its release. Bootlegs spread. Yorke kept playing it occasionally, alone, with Radiohead, and with Atoms for Peace, and in 2017 he and Jonny Greenwood played a rearranged version at an earthquake benefit in Italy.
1 nov 2021
released at last
It came out on 1 November 2021 as the second single from Kid A Mnesia: Yorke alone on acoustic guitar. The A.V. Club called it possibly the band's simplest pop song; Rolling Stone called it one of Yorke's darkest. Both are defensible.
The video stars Guy Pearce as a man followed around his own house by a drone.
the video
The official promo film.· Radioheadwatch on youtube →
takes(3)
Live history
| Times played | 12 shows |
|---|---|
| Live debut | Tuesday 17 October 2000 · Toronto |
| Last played | Thursday 29 June 2006 · Los Angeles |
| Longest absence | 2 years · back on Thursday 29 June 2006 · Los Angeles |
First played live in 2000, 21 years before it was released.
Nights played include broadcasts; opened and closed count gigs only. A cancelled night has no setlist. All setlist stats →
Tabs (1)
sources5
- Jonathan Dean, “Kid A Mnesia shows that the future is still Radiohead”, The Times.
- “Radiohead finally release fan favourite ‘Follow Me Around’”, NME, 1 November 2021.
- “Radiohead: ‘Follow Me Around’”, Stereogum, 1 November 2021.
- “Radiohead's long-awaited new single is one of the purest folk-pop songs they've ever written”, The A.V. Club, 1 November 2021.
- James Rettig, Stereogum, 20 August 2017.