Song · OK Computer era (1996–98)
Pearly*
A B-side the band played from Copenhagen in 1997 to Tokyo in 2001, often in the encores.
1997
the b-side
It went out on the first CD of the “Paranoid Android” single on 26 May 1997, and later on the Airbag / How Am I Driving? EP and the OKNOTOK reissue. It is one of the band's straight rockers from those sessions, and Thom Yorke, as Tim Footman tells it, summed it up as “a dirty song for people who use sex for dirty things”.
1997–2001
an encore song
It first turns up in the setlists in Copenhagen on 9 November 1997, in the second encore, and the band played it 22 times in 1998. After two years away it came back at Werchter on 11 September 2000.
In 2001 it was back in the encores. On the first of two nights at the Santa Barbara Bowl that June it came straight after “Karma Police”, and at Oslo Spektrum in September it was in the first encore, before Yorke came back alone with an acoustic guitar to open the second with “True Love Waits”. Its last night was Tokyo on 2 October 2001.
on stage
Live at Toronto, 1998.· Red Grapeswatch on youtube →
the record(1)
on stage(5)
Live history
| Times played | 36 shows |
|---|---|
| Live debut | Sunday 9 November 1997 · Copenhagen |
| Last played | Tuesday 2 October 2001 · Tokyo |
| Longest absence | 2 years · back on Monday 11 September 2000 · Werchter |
Nights played include broadcasts; opened and closed count gigs only. A cancelled night has no setlist. All setlist stats →
Tabs (1)
sources4
- Tim Footman, Radiohead: Welcome to the Machine, pp. 173–174, as cited by Wikipedia, “Paranoid Android”, for Yorke's description.
- Wikipedia, “Paranoid Android”, for the single's B-sides.
- This site's news archive, “Radiohead's ‘Paranoid Android’ goes in at number three, behind Hanson” (1 June 1997), for the release date; “Radiohead finish 29 nights across Europe in Aberdeen” (20 November 1997), for Copenhagen; “Radiohead return to Sweden and Norway and play ‘Hunting Bears’ live” (9 September 2001), for Oslo.
- Performance dates from this site's own setlist archive.