Song · A Moon Shaped Pool era (2015–21)
Tinker Tailor Soldier Sailor Rich Man Poor Man Beggar Man Thief
Its eleven-word title is a counting rhyme, and not one word of it is sung.
A Moon Shaped Poolalbum- 2016released
- 5:03length
2014–16
dub and a string coda
Jonny Greenwood wrote the string arrangement, and the London Contemporary Orchestra played it at RAK in London with Hugh Brunt conducting. Greenwood told NPR in the summer of 2016 that string days were the most exciting days of all to record.
Underneath the strings Jon Pareles counted electronic percussion and a distorted synthesiser in the New York Times. Will Hermes, in Rolling Stone, traced it to Greenwood's love of dub, already on show in his 2007 compilation Jonny Greenwood Is the Controller, and heard Thom Yorke's voice sliding in and out of the reverb while the percussion switched between electronic and acoustic, until a huge string coda pulled away over static. Jamie Milton in DIY gave Greenwood's orchestration the credit, and thought that without it the song would only have drifted.
The words are about holes everywhere coming alive at once, the lonely and the things that prey on them, and something people light fires to keep away crawling out on its belly, needing only a yes. Birds keep to the trees, fish go deep, and a voice asks to be come to before it is too late.
2016
encore, then main set
It was in the set from the first night of the tour, at the Heineken Music Hall in Amsterdam on 20 May 2016, and Daniel Kreps, reporting the show for Rolling Stone, picked it out as one of the best things on the new record. That night, at Le Zénith in Paris on 23 May and at the Roundhouse in London on 27 May it came in the first encore, and on 28 May, the last of the three Roundhouse nights, it moved up into the main set. It came back once more, at Madison Square Garden in New York on 26 July, and those five nights are all the archive has.
the rhyme
cherry stones and buttons
The title is the old counting rhyme, run all the way to the thief. The first four trades were grouped together as early as William Congreve's play Love for Love in 1695, and James Orchard Halliwell collected a version in the 1840s that was used for counting buttons; it has counted cherry stones and daisy petals too.
on stage
Live at Paris.· elephantbaciwatch on youtube →
the record(1)
on stage(2)
Live history
| Times played | 5 shows |
|---|---|
| Live debut | Friday 20 May 2016 · Amsterdam |
| Last played | Tuesday 26 July 2016 · New York |
Nights played include broadcasts; opened and closed count gigs only. A cancelled night has no setlist. All setlist stats →
sources7
- Will Hermes, review of A Moon Shaped Pool, Rolling Stone, 10 May 2016, for dub and the string coda.
- Bob Boilen, “All Songs +1: A Conversation With Radiohead's Jonny Greenwood”, NPR, 4 August 2016, for the string days.
- Jamie Milton, review of A Moon Shaped Pool, DIY, 11 May 2016, for the orchestration.
- Daniel Kreps, “Watch Radiohead Debut ‘Moon Shaped Pool’ Songs in Amsterdam”, Rolling Stone, 20 May 2016, for the debut.
- A Moon Shaped Pool album credits (XL Recordings, 2016), for the orchestra and conductor.
- Wikipedia, “A Moon Shaped Pool”, for the RAK string sessions and, citing Jon Pareles in The New York Times, 8 May 2016, the instrumentation.
- Wikipedia, “Tinker, Tailor”, for Congreve, Halliwell and the counting.