Song · Pablo Honey era (1992–93)
Thinking About You
Asked for a note on it in 1993, Radiohead sent four words.
Drill (EP)album- 1992released
- 2:15length
1991–93
two recordings
It dates from around 1991, when the band were still called On a Friday, and first appears on the Manic Hedgehog demo as a full electric arrangement, much faster than the one most people know. The Drill EP in 1992 used that same recording, and it turned up again on Itch, the EP EMI put out in Japan in 1994. For Pablo Honey they took it apart, down to acoustic guitar and a harmonium that Jonny Greenwood added.
When a free EMI and Q compilation CD asked every act for a note on its track in 1993, the others sent sleeve notes, and Radiohead's note for this one was four words, “A star is born”.
1991–98
oxford to melbourne
The archive's earliest entry is an Oxford show in 1991 with no date recorded, and it was busiest in 1993, the year of Pablo Honey. At Avalon in Boston on 8 October 1993, supporting Belly, Thom Yorke played it alone on acoustic guitar in the encore. It closed a show nine times before it dropped out of the set in Melbourne on 1 February 1998.
2003
the hardest piece
Christopher O'Riley, the American classical pianist, put it on True Love Waits, his 2003 album of Radiohead songs for solo piano. With no sheet music to work from, he wrote a repeating figure to stand in for the strummed guitar, and he told Tim Pfaff of the Bay Area Reporter that it had become the hardest music in his repertoire.
on stage
Live at the World Beat Center, San Diego, July 1993.· dt flwatch on youtube →
the record(1)
on stage(5)
Live history
| Times played | 63 shows · 2 of them Thom Yorke solo shows |
|---|---|
| Live debut | 1991 · Oxford |
| Last played | Tuesday 10 February 1998 · Perth |
| Closed the night | 9 times |
Thom Yorke, solo 11 July 1993 San Francisco, 28 March 1995 Toronto
Nights played include broadcasts; opened and closed count gigs only. A cancelled night has no setlist. Thom Yorke’s solo nights are counted and marked as his; the openers, closers, longest absence and chart are Radiohead’s own. All setlist stats →
Tabs (1)
sources6
- Wikipedia, “Pablo Honey” and “Drill (EP)”, for the recordings (the second citing Mac Randall, Exit Music, 2011, for the Drill tracks taken from the demo).
- Andrew Collins, Thom Yorke feature, Select, May 1993, for the note on the Q compilation.
- This site's own preserved 2003 lyrics pages, for the faster original and Itch.
- Andrea Femino, “a Honey of a band”, The Strobe, 20 October 1993, for Boston.
- Fred Child, “O'Riley & Radiohead”, NPR, 10 June 2003, for the arrangement; Tim Pfaff, review, Bay Area Reporter, 31 July 2003, for the hardest piece.
- Performance dates from this site's own setlist archive.