In early March 2025, all five members of Radiohead quietly formed a Limited Liability Partnership named RHEUK25. Historically, the band has created such entities ahead of major announcements, most recently, Dawn Chorus LLP before ‘A Moon Shaped Pool’ (2016) and Spin With a Grin ahead of the ‘Kid A Mnesia’ reissue (2021). This move alone is enough to fuel speculation that something big is on the way.

However, today, on platforms like Reddit, fans have noticed that flyers advertising Radiohead shows in London are available to pick at the Barbican Centre, an arts centre in the heart of London. The flyer claims that the band are to play four shows on the 21st, 22nd, 24th and 25th of November this year, with fans on Reddit speculating that they are taking place at the O2 Arena.

Similar flyers have also been found in across Europe, advertising shows in Berlin and Copenhagen at the start of December. This could indicate that a European tour may also be on the way, should the rumours be true.

I think it’s real – London dates
byu/fluffyargon inradiohead

Adding to the intrigue, Radiohead’s management, Blueyed Pictures, reportedly donated four tickets to a Los Angeles fire-relief auction with unusual wording: bidders could choose a “Radiohead concert of your choice” based on the band’s tour schedule. Although a spokesperson later clarified that Blueyed is not affiliated with the band and the listing was altered, the initial phrasing spread like wildfire among fans and media, amplifying speculation.

Taken together, these breadcrumbs suggest something stirring within Radiohead’s world: the LLP formation, the auction and the flyers could imply possible tour activity later in 2025. However, the lack of an official announcement and publicly dismissive tone from the band suggest caution. At this point, fans are left in a tantalizing in-between: signs point to something, but the mystery remains unsolved.

The irony of this is that ‘OK Computer’ is an album which plays on many themes, one being the feeling of technology moving too fast to keep up with. How captivating it is, that this very thing has recycled ‘Let Down’ into the Hot 100 once again.

TikTok is fast moving, constantly updating and changing, possibly leaving many in society in a grey area about the current trends or the channels through which something becomes popular. The title of the album itself is a play on words, it suggests that there’s a false narrative that computers make things ok, but the album dives deeper and leaves you feeling the opposite.

Speaking to The Rolling Stone in 2017 Yorke spoke about writing the album “I was getting into the sense of information overload…Which is ironic, really, since it’s so much worse now.” 

The 90s music scene was dominated by positivity. The rise of Britpop, bands like Oasis, Blur, Pulp and Suede echoed the changing of the times with bouncy tracks to get people on their feet and celebrating life. Radiohead were different. It was the opposite for the band from Oxfordshire, they instead thought life was going too fast, spiralling out of control. Listening to Radiohead you aren’t told to roll with it, instead you’re the person looking through the window from the inside out, windows big enough to see out of, but small enough hat people can’t see you within. The band are highlighting an imperfect existence in what Yorke thought was an overwhelming reality. Instead of looking forward to waking up in the year 2000, there’s this idea of worry and anxiety about what form the next century will assume.

‘Let down’ itself is a beautiful track, a journey into melodic intimacy,  oscillating through the toils of the 90s as the person who spectates as life passes by. The opening line of the song “Transport, motorways and tramlines” immediately delves into the overwhelming abundance of transport options, it’s significant that this comes first, as a listener you’re being thrown into the deep end immediately, bombarded with routes of travel.

The song is calm in its melody but builds and builds, until the floor collapses and you’re falling, crushed like a bug in the ground. The single glimmer of hope on the lyric sheet “one day i am gonna grow wings” is buckled by Thom Yorke’s melancholic tone.

Today’s younger generation are connecting with the song and the band, likely because of the relation to not knowing what direction to turn next, or feeling a lack of significance in such a fast paced society. The song was also featured in hit Disney Plus series ‘The Bear’, during a scene centred around confessing feelings. This further introduced it to an unexposed generation of Radiohead fans in waiting.

Radiohead’s last music success came in 2016 with their album ‘A Moon Shaped Pool.’ The band don’t currently have any plans to go back on tour,  but after a surprise release of a live album this month, maybe we can all hope to see ‘Let down’ live on stage again soon.

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In a conversation with Electronic Sound magazine, Thom said: “As far as I can tell in music and art and all creative industries, Al is so far only able to ‘create’ variations on genuine human artistic expression, and those are obvious. Is Al capable of genuine original creative thought? I have yet to see that. It analyses and steals and builds iterations without acknowledging the original human work it analysed. It creates pallid facsimiles, which is useful in the same way auto-accompaniment is useful, or a screensaver of a beautiful natural landscape in a billionaire’s bunker is.”

“But the economic structure is morally wrong… the human work used by AI to fake its creativity is not being acknowledged. Writers are not paid. It’s a weird kind of wanky, tech-bro nightmare future, and it seems this is what the tech industry does best. A devaluing of the rest of humanity, other than themselves, hidden behind tech. In the US right now, we are witnessing this spilling over into politics. We are, in modern parlance, creatives, which is a term I find deeply offensive because it arrived around the time that art morphed into ‘content’ for devices.”

The singer, who has always been very outspoken, was one of the many artists to sign the petition against AI amongst names such as ABBA’s Björn Ulvaeus, The Cure’s Robert Smith, Kate Bush, Blur’s Damon Albarn and more. The petition read: “The unlicensed use of creative works for training generative AI is a major, unjust threat to the livelihoods of the people behind those works, and must not be permitted.”

Yorke recently issued a statement regarding his stance on the Israel-Gaza conflict. You can find our MXDWN coverage on that here.

The British rockstar has been criticised and questioned before by fans for his silence on the issue. Yorke was heckled at a solo gig in Melbourne last October, where a crowd member screamed at the singer, “How can you be silent?”. Yorke then invited the heckler up to say his piece, before leaving and then returning to the stage to play the Radiohead hit ‘Karma Police’.

@apnewsentertainment Thom Yorke left a stage mid-show in Melbourne, Australia after challenging a heckler to take his mic over comments on the Israel-Hamas conflict. #thomyorke ♬ original sound – AP Entertainment

In a long post on Instagram, Yorke addressed the Melbourne moment: “Some guy shouting at me from the dark last year when I was picking up a guitar to sing the final song alone in front of 9000 people in Melbourne didn’t really seem like the best moment to discuss the unfolding humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza.

Afterwards I remained in shock that my supposed silence was somehow being taken as complicity, and I struggled to find an adequate way to respond to this and to carry on with the rest of the shows on the tour.

That silence, my attempt to show respect for all those who are suffering and those who have died, and to not trivialize it in a few words, has allowed other opportunistic groups to use intimidation and defamation to fill in the blanks, and I regret giving them this chance. This has had a heavy toll on my mental health.”

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Later in the statement, Yorke criticized Israeli prime minister Benjam Netanyahu and his administration: “I think Netanyahu and his crew of extremists are totally out of control and need to be stopped, and that the international community should put all the pressure it can on them to cease. Their excuse of self-defence has long since worn thin and has been replaced by a transparent desire to take control of Gaza and the West Bank permanently.

I believe this ultra-nationalist administration has hidden itself behind a terrified & grieving people and used them to deflect any criticism, using that fear and grief to further their ultra-nationalist agenda with terrible consequences, as we see now with the horrific blockade of aid to Gaza.”

He also condemned Hamas, similarly calling out the militant movement/terror group for using Gaza’s pain to further their own agenda: “Why did Hamas choose the truly horrific acts of October 7th? The answer seems obvious, and I believe Hamas chooses too to hide behind the suffering of its people, in an equally cynical fashion for their own purposes.”

Radiohead have a long history with Israel – it was the first country to give widespread radio airplay to their debut single ‘Creep’ after it failed to generate buzz anywhere else.

In 2017, the band played a concert in Tel Aviv against the advice of the pro-Palestine BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) movement. After BDS director Ken Loach wrote an op-ed for The Independent pleading for Radiohead to join the boycott, Yorke stood firm in his impartiality to Israel’s conflict: “Playing in a country isn’t the same as endorsing the government.

“We’ve played in Israel for over 20 years through a succession of governments, some more liberal than others. As we have in America. We don’t endorse [Israeli prime minister Benjamin] Netanyahu any more than [Donald] Trump, but we still play in America.”

Recently, Radiohead guitarist Jonny Greenwood has had to cancel UK shows with Israeli-born rock musician Dudu Tassa due to “credible threats” to their safety. You can read more on that here.

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Radiohead’s vocalist and frontman Thom Yorke has been working alongside Tony award-winning directors Christine Jones and Steve Hoggatt to bring his ideas to life. The show is a modern adaptation of the Shakespeare classic ‘Hamlet’, which Radiohead announced the production of on Instagram in 2024, sharing Yorke’s nerves and excitement to attempt this new project.    

 

 

 

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‘Hamlet: Hail to the Thief’ premiered in Aviva Studios in Manchester in April and will continue to show here until 18 May. In June, the production will then be available to attend in Stratford’s Royal Shakespeare Theatre.

Radiohead’s ‘Hail to the Thief’ did not originally come to be with inspiration from Shakespeare’s Hamlet. The band explained the inspiration for the record and its political focus in interviews upon its release. With Hamlet’s themes on power and corruption, the relationship between the two projects makes for an exciting production. 

Yorke explained in an interview with The Observer, that he realised the connection between ‘Hail to the Thief’ and Hamlet long after the album’s creation. Director Jones also shared that she found a relationship between the play’s dialogue and the album’s lyricism. Here, Yorke went on to reveal his initial hesitation, thinking Hamlet was “untouchable”. However, he pressed on with the production since “the idea didn’t go away”. When reimagining the album as a theatrical performance, Yorke considered how the music would translate to live theatre, expressing that he wanted, “a band playing, but rather than an orchestra in a pit, actually playing. Not playing as a covers band.” 

The trailer is dark and ominous, sparking excitement with fans. Those who have seen the Manchester premiere have shared images from the show, revelling in the magic of the production.

Words cannot express the experience that was Halmet Hail to the Thief. #HailtotheThief #hamlet #avivastudios pic.twitter.com/Xmw76vZEjy

— Dara (@GhostofDara) April 27, 2025

Yorke’s creative endeavours reach great heights in theatre and music, with an upcoming album ‘Tall Tales’ with Mark Prichard along with a global screening event on 8 May. Tickets are available here, and tickets for upcoming dates of ‘Hamlet: Hail to the Thief’ can be found on the Factory International website and the Royal Shakespeare Company website.

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Brought to life by Australian visual artist Jonathan Zawada, the ‘Tall Tales’ film is set to be an immersive experience that’s been described as a “fairy tale for the modern world; depicting rising tides, kings & queens, amazon logistics and robotic arms under iridescent skies.” Preview the trailer below.

A limited run of zines will also be available at the exclusive event, curated and designed by Zawada, which details the conceptual ideas behind the film and album.

Ahead of its release May 9, fans have so far heard two singles from the record – ‘Back In The Game’ and ‘This Conversation Is Missing Your Voice.’ The upcoming album has already been hailed as a “multi-layered, richly textured record that channels both multiple narratives and multiple genres” which holds promises of demonstrating “Pritchard’s mastery of archaic machines unearthed in synthesiser archives, guiding the music down unexpected and experimental paths,” across its anticipated twelve tracks. The album will be released digitally, along with a standard black vinyl 2LP gatefold edition and a limited-edition black vinyl 2LP version. The limited edition includes a 36-page booklet featuring an extensive collection of project images and full track lyrics, thoughtfully designed by Zawada. Additionally, a standard CD edition will be available, as well as a special limited CD version that comes with the 36-page booklet. ‘Tall Tales’ is available for pre-order here.

The collaborative project between the Radiohead frontman and electronic producer Pritchard marks the first since the 2016 track ‘Beautiful People’. The duo both took to social media earlier last month to tease the first of the new singles, ‘Back In The Game’, later sharing a live version taken from show this month that Yorke played at the Sydney Opera House whilst on his solo tour of Asia, Australia and New Zealand in late 2024. See below for the videoclip.

For more information on the ‘Tall Tales’ exclusive screening, follow the respective link.

‘This Conversation Is Missing Your Voice’ marks the second single from Tall Tales, following ‘Back In The Game’, which dropped last month. The pair recently surprised fans by performing the track live for the first time at the Sydney Opera House during Pritchard’s headlining set.

Pritchard and Yorke’s friendship goes back years—the two previously collaborated on ‘Beautiful People’ from Pritchard’s 2016 album, Under the Sun. Pritchard’s most recent LP under his own name, The Four Worlds, arrived in 2018. Meanwhile, The Smile—Yorke’s project with Jonny Greenwood and Tom Skinner—released two albums last year, Wall of Eyes and Cutouts.

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In a statement shared on Instagram, Yorke revealed that the album took shape during the COVID-19 lockdown, when Pritchard sent him a batch of MP3 files that felt too compelling to ignore. “I knew straight away that I had to drop what I was doing,” Yorke wrote. “It felt very much that I had not been anywhere like this before.”

A press release describes Zawada as an unofficial “third member” of the project, explaining that his music videos for both singles are part of a feature-length film he has been developing in tandem with the album’s creation.

Here is the full track List from the upcoming album:

01. A Fake in a Faker’s World
02. Ice Shelf
03. Bugging Out Again
04. Back in the Game
05. White Cliffs
06. The Spirit
07. Gangsters
08. This Conversation Is Missing Your Voice
09. Tall Tales
10. Happy Days
11. The Men Who Dance in Stags’ Heads
12. Wandering Genie

On an Instagram post February 7, the Radiohead frontman shared an enigmatic video clip, accompanied by a hauntingly pulsating audio as a preview for the new release. Although presenting no caption, collaborator Mark Pritchard enlightened fans, posting the same video clip, stating: “BACK IN THE GAME. 13.02.25. SIGN UP FOR NEWS.” He also tagged Yorke in the post, along with Warp Records and artist Jonathan Zawada. 

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Fans heard the live debut of ‘Back In The Game’ in October at Yorke’s show in Christchurch, New Zealand, as part of his solo Everything Tour. Captured on video via the audience, the single later appeared on a Reddit-discovered ASCAP list which features a dozen unreleased collaborations between the ‘Karma Police’ singer and Pritchard. This leaves many to believe that we can expect to see a lengthier studio release from the pair following the announcement of ‘Back In The Game’. See below for the live performance of the new single ‘Back In The Game’:

This is not the first time Pritchard – English-born, Australian-based electronic artist and producer – and Yorke have worked together. In 2011, Pritchard remixed Radiohead’s ‘Bloom’, and in 2016, Yorke featured on Pritchard’s track ‘Beautiful People’ from his album ‘Under The Sun’. A few years later, Pritchard returned the favour by remixing Yorke’s ‘Not The News’.  The announcement follows a series of controversies surrounding the ‘Creep’ singer as of late. Back in October, Yorke briefly walked off stage at his Melbourne show after being heckled by a protester, calling on the singer to “condemn the Israeli genocide of Gaza.” This comes amid ongoing criticism of Radiohead for their alleged support of Israel. Recently, the band’s lead guitarist, Jonny Greenwood, received backlash from the media for his solo collaborative efforts with Israeli artist Dudu Tessa. In defence of Radiohead’s political stance when it comes to their music, Yorke has previously let his neutral opinion be known, stating: “Playing a country isn’t the same as endorsing its government.” 

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In lighter news of Radiohead’s future as a touring band, Yorke has revealed there aren’t any current plans for the group to hit the road. In an interview with Australian radio station Double J, the frontman said: “No offence to anyone and err, thanks for caring. But I think we’ve earned the right to do what makes sense to us without having to explain ourselves or be answerable to anyone else’s historical idea of what we should be doing.”  

For more Radiohead-related news, as well as band members’ solo efforts, fans can check out their official website. 

She joins the likes of creative industry heavy-weights such as Paul McCartney, Thom Yorke, Stephen Fry, and Kevin Bacon amongst other actors, musicians, and writers, all of whom are raising alarms over what could be described as an assault on creative integrity.

The campaign, which emerged earlier this year, has gathered momentum with over 37,000 signatures. Its mission is clear: to prevent tech companies from exploiting copyrighted materials without consent. In a sharp rebuke to policymakers, it calls for urgent legislative action to shield creators from the encroachments of AI.

Bush’s endorsement is particularly resonant. Having stepped back from the public eye in recent years, the ‘Wuthering Heights’ singer’s decision to re-engage on this issue underscores its importance. Her involvement follows a rare interview in which she revealed a hunger to return to the recording studio, brimming with ideas for new music. It’s a striking juxtaposition: an artist who has long defined herself by her originality now confronting a technology that threatens to undermine precisely that.

It is not just creatives who are speaking out about the issue and signing the petition. Industry executives such as the composer Edward Newton-Rex - also a former senior executive at Stability AI who resigned over the matter – have warned about the potential for AI to dehumanise art by using it as training information for AI models. Newton-Rex and his non-profit Fairly Trained are working to ensure that creators are being treated fairly in the development of AI.

There have already been several cases where legal action has been brought to an AI company over the non-consensual use of copyrighted work. In early 2023 Getty Images filed a lawsuit against Stability AI in the UK High Court. The court proceedings gained momentum throughout 2023, with significant developments including judicial reviews allowing the case to proceed. The lawsuit is ongoing, and its trial is expected to address key legal questions surrounding copyright and AI training datasets​. The lawsuit encapsulates a larger cultural reckoning: as AI’s appetite for creative material grows, so too does the urgency to reconcile innovation with fair compensation for the human ingenuity it relies upon.

Cases such as these, coupled with events such as the deeply negative reaction to advertisements like Apple’s ‘Crush!’—released earlier this year, depicting a car crusher compacting a towering heap of creative tools, from pianos to paint pots, into an iPad— demonstrate that the delicate goodwill of utility that has existed between the tech and creative industries is being slowly eroded.

Companies like OpenAI, Meta, Stability AI and Apple are at a pivotal junction of trust between their creative consumer base and themselves. The response to this growing dissent at the appropriate or inappropriate use of AI, whether from government policymakers or the tech companies themselves, will likely shape the future dynamics between technology and the creative community for years to come.

This confluence of artistic voices and industry voices coming together in this petition represents a rare moment of solidarity across genres, generations, and mediums as musicians, actors, and writers band together to protect their craft. As Kate Bush herself looks to rekindle her creative spark, her message is clear: the future of music and art should be first and foremost in human hands, not at the mercy of imitative algorithms.

Songs from Hail To The Thief, released over 20 years ago, will be deconstructed and remoulded into a score to be performed by live musicians and cast members. Thom Yorke will taking the musical helm, after having proved himself as a composer for previous soundtracks, including Confidenza this year and 2018’s Suspiria. His upcoming orchestrations were commented upon by the frontman himself.

According to a post he made on Instagram, he says:

“This is an interesting and intimidating challenge adapting the original music of Hail to The Thief for live performance with the actors on stage to tell this story that is forever being told, using its familiarity and sounds, pulling them into and out of context.. seeing what chimes with the underlying grief and paranoia of Hamlet, using the music as a “presence” in the room, watching how it collides with the action and the text. Ghosting one against the other.”

Thom worked alongside designer & director Christine Jones and director & choreographer Steven Hoggett to create a new adaptation of Shakespeare’s Hamlet - a tragedy about a son who has to find his own way, after his father is murdered. Who could forget Disney’s The Lion King hugely popular adaptation!

After vividly remembering hearing the album for the first-time, Christine Jones makes the case to use Hail To The Thief:

“It changed my DNA,” she recalled. “Not long after, I was reading Hamlet and listening to the album. Paying attention to the lyrics, I became aware of how many songs from Hail to the Thief speak to the themes of the play.

“There are uncanny reverberances between the text and the album. For years I’ve wanted to see the play and album collide in a piece of theatre. Eventually I shared the idea with Thom, who was intrigued.

“I wasn’t sure what we would make, but I knew I wanted to make it with Steven [Hoggett] and continue experimenting and building on work we have done together over many years.”

She added: “We’ve found that the play haunts the album, and the album haunts the play. Both reflect the internal disquiet and rage that result from despair – in particular despair arising from scrutiny of dominant power structures – whether within governments, communities, or families.”

It doesn’t seem much of a stretch, as Radiohead share another William Shakespeare adaptation, after they featured Talk Show Host.on the soundtrack to Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo and Juliet (1996).

Radiohead’s foray into the theatre world will commence with the production’s world premiere taking place at Aviva Studios, Manchester, home of Factory International from 27th April – 18th May 2025, before moving to the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon from 4th – 28th June 2025.

If you subscribe to W.A.S.T.E., – the official Radiohead and Radiohead-related news, tour tickets and merchandise – you can get early access to tickets on Tuesday 1st October 2024 at 10am BST. Otherwise, tickets are available on general sale on Wednesday 2nd October 2024.