Much has been written in the press and elsewhere about Kid A, some fawningly positive, much of it gratuitously negative. A problem with journalists is they often need to write an article after listening only once. Kid A doesn't really lend itself to this kind of 'quick and dirty' assessment. First impressions are important, but much more is revealed on subsequent listenings. Here, for what it's worth, is my interpretation of the album, and in particular its lyrics.

Go here for a transcription of an interview with Ed and Colin about Kid A on Japanese TV.

Comments, criticisms, suggestions to attackn01@yahoo.co.uk

the album	optimistic
everything in its right place	in limbo
kid a	idioteque
the national anthem	morning bell
how to disappear completely and never be found	motion picture soundtrack
treefingers

the album

The lyrics to Kid A have been described as 'incomprehensible' and 'nonsensical'. There is an element of truth in both of these accusations. In several of the songs, Thom's voice has been distorted by computer (probably in ProTools), making the lyrics difficult to hear in several places. This distortion is not merely for the sake of it, but serves to blur the lines between voice and instrument, between human and machine, between analogue and digital. The fact that the lyrics have never been published doesn't help.

Some of the songs also sound lyrically somewhat random. Thom has said several times in interviews that he was having problem in writing words to songs during the period between OK Computer and Kid A. To get round this problem, he took snatches of lyrics (mostly single lines), put them in a hat, and drew them out at random when the band were rehearsing the songs. This adds to the odd atmosphere of certain songs (Everything In Its Right Place, Idioteque, Morning Bell), but also to our difficulty in understanding them. It is unlikely, however, that lyrics would be left in the final product unless they fitted in with the overall theme of the song. There is method in this madness. Thom also seems to find some gratification in a literary precedent for this style of writing, as it is not unlike the 'exquisite corpse' poetry of Tristan Tzara and the Dadaists, and TS Eliot's The Wasteland.

A more musical point of reference for the album is Talking Heads' Remain in Light. Colin had this to say about Kid A: "We hope the album is a piece a work that works from beginning to end, reflects the music we were listening to, and how we were working together during the recording process."

The album is partly about ' the generation that will inherit the earth when we've wiped evrything (sic) out'. This fits in with the idea of Kid A as the first human clone. Thom also talked about 'a lot of apocalyptic imagery. I couldn't get rid of it, so I put it on the album'. We could argue, pretentiously, that this makes Kid A a classic 'fin de siecle' work. It is filled with images of disintegration and decay: of communication, of ethics, of society itself.

There is also a strong political element. The band's interest in politics is well known. Kid A deals with Thom's despair at the way globalization is destroying the world, particularly the developing world, and also his feelings of disappointment at the current Labour government in the UK. Thom has cited Gorge Orwell's novel 1984 as an influence on the album. There will be much more of this in the next album, especially in songs such as 'You and Whose Army?', 'Dollars and Cents'. A recent live version of 'Follow Me Around' also expresses disappointment in the performance of the Government (see unreleased songs page) .

The 'hidden' booklet in the first pressings of Kid A created some controversy in the UK press for its unabashed caricature and criticism of the current government. It contain a grinning anti-christlike cartoon of Tony Blair, accompanied by the lines, "He'll take the money from under your nose. He'll tell you all you want to hear. He paints himself reflective white to reflect the blast when it comes. He will take your children and he'll break your homes. He will tell you how hard he is trying, but we're all in the market now. He says he wants to be our friend. He says he's always been on our side. Tough choices with difficult decisions that you really wouldn't understand". The dedication of the album 'to Leo' is probably to Phil's baby son, however, not the Prime Minister's.

Thom has described the hidden booklet as an exercise by Stanley and himself to put down on paper a lot of the thoughts and ideas that were going around in their heads in the year up to the completion of Kid A. He also claims an influence from TS Eliot's 'The Wasteland'. The style of the booklet - and even more so, the poster for the Kid A tour - with its use of a wide variety of fonts, is reminiscent of Victorian circus posters. Perhaps Stanley was thinking in particular of the poster that influenced the Beatles song, 'Being For The Benefit of Mr Kite'.

According to Ed, the best time to listen to Kid A is at about four or five in the morning, after a 'banging night out'.

everything in its right place

A song by Thom and Nigel. This song’s position as the album opener is probably one of the main reasons for the accusations in the press reviews that the album is ‘meaningless’ and doesn’t have any real songs or lyrics.

The title is probably a reference to the band finally getting their act together after a long barren period when they first started work on Kid A. ‘Even when life spat in his face, he put everything back in its right place’. Thom and Ed, have both described it in interviews as the first time everyone said 'Yeah, that makes sense'.

It also suggests the inability to communicate: only seeing things in black and white, and not hearing what other people say. The line about 'sucking a lemon' probably bears more relation to the insult 'go suck a lemon' (which, incidentally, turns up in james Joyce's Ulysses), than to Led Zeppelin's 'squeeze my lemon till the juice runs down my leg'. It also describes the 3-year long bad mood Thom was plunged into in the wake of OK Computer, and all the hype that went with it. He explained in an interview with Rolling Stone, "In England "sucking a lemon" refers to "the face you pull because a lemon is so tart." (He twists his sharp features into a ferocious grimace)." That's the face I had for three years."

The jokey version from the webcast with Ed O’Brien on vocals includes lots of reference to past, present and future albums: ‘We are plants, happy plants’, ‘A grin like roadkill’, ‘Standing in the shadows at the end of the bed’, ‘They will chew you up, they will spit out your bones’.

The way the vocals in this, and several other songs, are distorted and manipulated, suggests the de-humanisation of people, which is a constant theme of the album.

kid a

A slightly nasty number, reminiscent of ‘Climbing Up The Walls’. It speaks of power (the rats and children follow me), corruption (heads on sticks, ventriloquists, little white lie) and fear (the shadows) in a post-Orwellian future (or present). The ‘rats and children’ part is, of course, a reference to the Pied Piper of Hamelin, but also is a possible metaphor for the current government. Also the first of many references to children on this album, and amnesiac. The unseen presence in the shadows echoes the ‘You’ll only see my reflection’ of the earlier song. The song was sung through a vocoder, with the notes triggered by the ondes martinot he was playing. The result is very inhuman and disturbing. ‘Kid A’ creates a feeling of unease, which sucks the listener in. Don’t play it to your kids.

The title comes from a sample of kids’ voices the band used, but later abandoned, when recording. Thom apparently also likes the idea that the album is dedicated to the first human clone. "... the idea that, somewhere, some errant scientist has already created the first completely genetically cloned baby - Kid A. I'm sure it has happened. I'm sure somewhere it has already been done, even though it's illegal now."

the national anthem

A national anthem for a brave new world. Whatever you say, whatever you think, the truth is you’re just holding on. Again fear (of Big Brother) raises its head. The brass band creates a nice feeling of chaos at the end of this song, with a kind of broken-down anthem. This song was apparently originally entitled 'Everyone' (thanks to Das Monkey).

In live performances, Thom sings 'don't give in, don't give up' over and over in the coda.

how to disappear completely and never be found

The title of the song comes from a book dealing in how to slip out of society, and reappear with a totally different identity. This is not really the subject here.

Being a star is not as attractive as we might think. The song recalls Thom’s horror at being followed around Dublin by hordes of fans, when ‘OK Computer’ suddenly went stellar, and Radiohead graduated from small halls to huge concerts. ‘I’m not here, this isn’t happening’ is a ‘mantra’ (apparently courtesy of Michael Stipe), as means of 'putting the shutters down'. Repeat it enough times, and all those people will go away. The floating down the Liffey part comes from a dream. The setting of Dublin for this song makes one think of Joyce's epic 'Finnegans Wake', which begins with a trip down the Liffey.

The line "strobe lights and blown speakers, fireworks and hurricanes" probably refers to the Glastonbury concert, which Thom describes thus in Renaissance Men:

"When we turned the lights on the audience, it was suddenly dawned on me that actually everything was alright. That it didn't fucking matter whether the speakers blew up....There was a point where I did walk off, but I turned back. And then the fireworks went off. Literally. It was bonkers"

This is one of the few parts of the album where the meaning is fairly evident, rather than hidden by obscure references or vocal distortion. The feeling of unease at being followed by strangers is echoed in the song 'Follow Me Around'. This, like Motion Picture Soundtrack, also seems like a kind of farewell to the past.

Earlier live versions included the following lines near the beginning of the song:

I know what I've seen

You pulled me up

Threw me back again

treefingers

This is reminiscent of the works of Gyorgy Ligeti, and Tangerine Dream’s ‘Mysterious semblances at the strand of nightmares’, as well as Brian Eno. Jonny described it as 'speaker-breaking', explaining, "it has frequencies in it that can disturb the neighbours, whilst still being very slow and ambient and having no rhythm in it."

The title is probably a pun on the fact that you can play this song with just three fingers. Lyrically not very interesting, though.

optimistic

Jokingly called 'Poptimistic' by the band. A pessimist look at 21^st century realpolitik, and the cynicism of contemporary society. We prey on one another, the strong destroy the weak, and nobody helps anyone else. "We are all just happy consumers".

The ‘this one’s…’ verse sounds like a caricature of the present cabinet (though 'this one went to market' is taken from a children's rhyme). The ‘pail (or payload) of fodder for the animals’ refers to the scraps thrown by the government to keep us quiet. Of course ‘Animal farm’ is a George Orwell reference, and we all remember what happened there. Just like the pigs in the Orwell story, the current government is becoming indistinguishable from those who came before. Who is the messed-up marionette? Perhaps he is the impotent rock star.

'The best you can is good enough' is a line Thom often hears from his girlfriend. Recently, in live performances, he has been changing the words of the verse from our point of view to theirs: ‘The best you can is NOT good enough’

in limbo

This song was originally called 'Lost at Sea'

It's a love song, about the way a couple’s personal problems and obsessions become obstacles in their relationship. While Thom was going quietly depressed and barmy during his period of writer’s block (lost at sea), his girlfriend was absorbed in Dante’s ‘Purgatorio’ (Limbo). Their were each in their own fantasy land. The song is a plea: ‘Come back’. A desperate attempt at reconciliation before the pair drift too far apart.

The two often had a recording of Dante playing in the car, as they were driving around, and this influenced the imagery in the song. 'The most beautiful woman in the world' is also perhaps an allusion to Dante's infatuation with Beatrice ('Come back' being the voice of despair at Beatrice's death, aged 25)

At the 2001 Shoreline show, Thom introduced the song thus: "This is a song about someone trying to get you back from somewhere you're stuck, and you're very very stuck"

Ed, in his diary, used the term ‘in limbo’ to refer to the band’s inability to get anything done, and put everything in its right place.

Lundy, Fastnet and Irish Sea are all locations used in shipping forecasts. Being unable to read the message is a sly reference to being lost at sea.

idioteque

Another ‘wake up and get your head out of the sand song’. Some of the lines seem to be chosen for their sound as much as meaning, but the overall implication is this: While we’re all living in our bunkers like happy plants, and chattering away on our mobiles, making deals, the world is falling around our ears. It is one of the 'out of the hat' songs, the lines all being ideas that kept Thom awake at night. This song, like the hidden booklet served to exorcise those ideas.

Ed, in a TV interview shown in Japan, said :"In Idioteque, the line "ice age coming, ice age come" reflects how we feel at the moment that the state of the world is in"

The last line may be ‘Your father’s little children’. At Punchestown, it sounded like ‘Your mother’s little children’. 'Ice age coming' may or may not be a reference to the Clash's London Calling. Take the Money and Run was, incidentally, Woody Allens's first movie as a director. The line has been lurking subconsciously for some time. Before the release of OK Computer, Thom said in an interview: "I sort of envision myself in a sort of a Billy Graham role, you know...shake hands, and spread the word of God and fuck off, and take the money and run..."

In a radio interview, Thom called this his favourite song on the album. In live performances, he does a wild dance towards the end.

Apparently, the band wanted to have at least one song on the album, which would make you want to 'dance until your head fell off'. This is perhaps the most radically 'un-Radiohead' song on the album, but a taste of things to come in songs like 'Packt'.

morning bell

Thom called this ‘a song about amnesia’. At one of the Paris concerts he introduced it as a song about 'forgetting who you are, or anything about yourself, then waking up one day, looking at yourself in the mirror, and remembering'

It deals with the pain of separation, though again some of the words sound a little random, and ‘out of the hat’. The line 'cut the kids in half' is perhaps an allusion to the Biblical wisdom of Solomon.

The ‘walking’ section is somewhat unclear (and varies in content when performed live), but seems to be about the problems of communication and relationships (‘The lights are on but nobody’s home….everyone lies to me……everyone wants to be your friend, but nobody wants to be your slave…..)

Thom has also said that this song describes his own experience of living in a haunted house.

motion picture soundtrack

An old love song, re-modelled in a tongue-in-cheek fashion with Jonny’s over-the-top arrangement. Colin wrote, "Motion Picture Soundtrack was another Coltrane inspiration. My brother Jonny used her harps for that".

Apart from the bitterness and despair of separation, it is also about the dichotomy between real life and the imaginary world we create for ourselves, or have created for us (‘It’s all Disney’s fault’).

The song also hints at suicide as being the only way to be released from despair.

It’s a splendid end to the album, but perhaps doesn’t do justice to the original song. For some reason 'white wine' becomes 'red wine', and he last ‘beautiful angel’ verse has been cut in this version. It goes like this:

beautiful angel, pulled apart at birth

limbless and helpless

I don't even recognise you

I think you're crazy, maybe, etc.....

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