Song · Kid A / Amnesiac era (2000–01)
Knives Out
373 days to record the most straightforward thing they had written in years, with a guitar part aimed squarely at Johnny Marr.
Amnesiacalbum- 2001released
- 4:15length
1999–2000
three hundred and seventy-three days
It came out of the sessions that produced both Kid A and Amnesiac, and it is the odd one out: a guitar song on records that had walked away from guitars. Yorke said it was “no departure at all” and “survived because it was too good to miss”.
Ed O'Brien's studio diary put a number on the work: 373 days from start to finish.
Probably the most straight-ahead thing we've done in years… and that might explain why we took so long on it.
ed o'brien · ed's diary, 22 july 1999
His theory was that successful bands ruin simple songs by adding to them, particularly songs written on an acoustic guitar, and that the long grind was what stopped them doing it. They played it during a studio webcast in December 1999, well before anyone could buy it.
The guitars are pointed at the Smiths, deliberately. O'Brien played it to Johnny Marr before release.
I was beyond flattered and quite speechless, which takes some doing. He explained to me that with that song they'd tried to take a snapshot of the way I'd done things in the Smiths, and I guess you can hear that in it.
johnny marr, may 2003
the words
cannibalism, more or less
Yorke has described the lyrics as being about cannibalism, about “the idea of the businessman walking out on his wife and kids and never coming back”, and about the “thousand-yard stare when you look at someone close to you and you know they're gonna die”. The eating is a metaphor and it is not a gentle one.
jul 2001
the single, and gondry's hospital
It was the second single from Amnesiac, after “Pyramid Song”, and reached 13 in Britain and number one in Canada. Michel Gondry directed the video: Yorke grieving in a hospital room, the set pulled apart and rebuilt around him. Gondry was going through a break-up and put that into it, then fell out with the band over exactly that.
I showed [Yorke] a storyboard and every single detail: he was completely excited and happy for it, and then, it turned out, they all criticise me for being selfish and putting my own views on it and my own introspection… It did not go smoothly, but if it went smoothly, it would be mediocre.
michel gondry · the playlist, 26 june 2008
The Flaming Lips, Christopher O'Riley and Brad Mehldau have all covered it.
the video
The promo, directed by Michel Gondry.· Radioheadwatch on youtube →
takes(2)
Live history
| Times played | 56 shows |
|---|---|
| Live debut | Thursday 9 December 1999 · London |
| Last played | Sunday 5 October 2008 · Saitama |
| Longest absence | 2 years · back on Monday 5 June 2006 · Boston |
First played live in 1999, 2 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)
sources7
- Ed O'Brien, “Ed's Diary”, 22 July 1999.
- Greg Kot, “‘It's difficult justifying being a rock band’”, Chicago Tribune, 31 July 2001.
- Johnny Marr, interview, EMAP, May 2003, and Barney Hoskyns, Rock's Backpages, September 2001.
- Michael Roffman, “Tricks or treats: Radiohead's ‘Knives Out’”, Consequence of Sound, 7 October 2010.
- Ryan Schreiber, “Radiohead: Amnesiac”, Pitchfork, 4 June 2001.
- Rodrigo Perez, interview with Michel Gondry, The Playlist, 26 June 2008.
- Teri Vanhorn, “Radiohead debut song during webcast”, MTV News, 11 December 1999.