Radiohead - 4 Minute Warning

So back when I wrote about the bonus disc for In Rainbows I probably didn’t properly disclose how awesome the six, formal, songs are on it. Radiohead’s last album is still the ten-song beast we’ve come to love but with it are these other choice cuts that while they aren’t on the album, are probably just as amazing as anything else on it. Either way, “4 Minute Warning” is the gorgeous closer to that bonus disc and in talking about “Separator” last night, it made sense to maybe touch on why this other stuff that they were making before The King of Limbs is so good too.

There’s just something so perfect about it: its structure is a basic verse-chorus combination that gels in just over, well, four minutes, there’s a great deal of noisy darkness at the beginning of it and then, by the end of it you’re left with a beautifully light stunner. There’s background chatter on this one and there’s even more amazing words on it. I think the part about nightmares that’s most scary is the fact that you’re just dying to wake up from them and yet you just can’t seem to. I got to see most of Eternal Sunshine… yesterday (through an awesome pick by an awesome person) and wow, dreams and feelings and nostalgia. Radiohead’s beautiful in pin-pointing those aching feelings we feel when we’re in complete denial: “I just want to run and hide” is what Thom Yorke sings to the support of a choir of voices that sound like ghostly creatures. At the end, he’s even more uplifting, “Soon I'm going to wake up…someone’s going to bring me around” and it’s that sort of swoon one feels when their lover shows up to take them away. Then again, this could just be about wanting to escape or it could be about something concrete and much deeper than silly feelings. I’m not entirely sure but well, Radiohead’s been destroying me all over lately and this is still part of the massive collection of music they made during the In Rainbows. Their depth is what’s so amazing, you can hear U2 and R.E.M. on something like this and still, it’s a Radiohead singular closer. – Bryan

Radiohead – In Rainbows (Bonus Disc)

Back in October of 2007, Radiohead self-released In Rainbows, offering a ‘pay-what-you-want’ process for purchasing the album. You could put as little or as much as you wanted and still, you got the music no matter what. With that offer was a special little discbox (that isn't so little) that would include the album on CD and 2 vinyl LPs, artwork, a special edition case and a second, bonus disc. That bonus disc wasn’t released when the physical CD hit the shelves on New Year’s Day 2008 but it has some of the best songs the band wrote during the In Rainbows sessions.

Here is a personal video for “Last Flowers,” a piano-driven ballad. This version is probably almost identical to the album version, with the most important factors being highlighted: Thom Yorke’s voice and the piano melody. “And If I’m gonna talk, I just wanna talk” is simply sung, as if that’s something we rarely receive. I think it’s better than the other piano-led stuff they left on In Rainbows (“Nude,” “Videotap”) but maybe that’s just me:


And here is the version of “Down is the New Up,” that appears on the bonus disc. It’s creatively strong and a superb song on all accounts. “What is up…buttercup?” is what Yorke asks on this one, I wonder what is up myself sometimes. A lot of the album was about distorted realities and how some people’s perception is really, their reality. Here, a new agenda is brought up, as if to question what we desire and in the end, it’s Radiohead's trademark blur of sounds and mastery that wins out. – Bryan