Pulk-Pull*

The third song on Kid A is “The National Anthem.” According to the OED, an anthem (noun) is (third definition): “A song, as of praise or gladness. Also used of the English ‘National’ or ‘Royal Anthem,’ which is technically a hymn,” with a hymn being “An ode or song of praise in honour of a deity, a country.”

“God Save the King” is recognized as the English national anthem, but there is “no authorised version of the National Anthem as the words are a matter of tradition.” The Canadian information page on the royal anthem gives a slightly different history for the song than the English information page above. All accounts note that the song has “has never been proclaimed the national anthem by an Act of Parliament or a Royal Proclamation.” James Thomson’s 1740 ode “Rule, Britannia!” has also functioned as a national anthem, according to Suvir Kaul (1).

Attempting to read Radiohead’s “The National Anthem” as a surrogate anthem, one intended to take the absent national anthem’s place, is problematized by the fact that the basic anthem condition is not filled: the song is not one of praise. Instead, triumphant nationalism is replaced with claustrophobia. Everyone, as the song says, is “so near” and everyone has “got fear.” If a nation’s people can be said to rally around an anthem, the rallying this song envisions is far from positive. Beyond the lyrics, the song’s sonic heterogeneity further troubles any sense of community that an anthem would normally imply: Yorke’s voice sounds metallic, as if it is slicing through the unswerving bass line that is later conquered by the raging, Mingus-like brass section (see Message 121).

Kaul, Suvir. Poems of Nation, Anthems of Empire: English Verse in the Long Eighteenth Century. Charlottesville and London: University Press of Virginia, 2000.

I received word today from Ashgate Publishing that The Music and Art of Radiohead is scheduled for an early 2005 publication. If all goes as planned, the book will be available January 2005.

There are several ways to pre-order. The book is available for pre-ordering online directly from Ashgate in both paperback and hardback versions. The book is also listed for pre-order on Amazon.co.uk in both paperback and hardback versions.

The book is also available via Amazon.fr (France), Amazon.de (Germany), and Amazon.co.jp (Japan).

Here is the book’s description: The Music and Art of Radiohead includes compelling close readings of the English band’s music, lyrics, album cover art and music videos as well as critical commentary on interviews, reviews and the documentary film Meeting People is Easy. Established and emerging academic scholars engage Radiohead’s music and art via concerns of broader implication to contemporary cultural studies. Topics range from the band’s various musical and multivalent social contexts to their contested situation within a global market economy; from asking the question, ‘how free is art?’ to considering the band’s musical influences and radical sonic explorations. Together, the essays form a comprehensive discussion of Radiohead’s entire oeuvre, from Pablo Honey to Hail to the Thief, with a special focus on the critically acclaimed best-selling albums Kid A and Amnesiac.

Radiohead.com is changing. From the site page: “Greetings interested traveller; we welcome you to the front page of our humble website. We must apologise, for it is being rebuilt in a new idiom, inspired by the visions of Mssrs Donwood & Tchock. Much swearing and untangling of code is occuring in the potting shed. Rest assured; we are not trying to build anything confusing or hopelessly obscure; oh no… we would never dream of such a thing. It may, however, change and mutate uncontrollably when finished. This is good, this is what we wish too happen and it should. We are sort of busy, making new pictures and words and terrible fearsome code. As you can see from the photograph above we have decided to go back to basics and sit around this pump organ for a good old traditional middle of the road singsong like they used to do in the Olden Days before it all went wrong, when rock’n’roll was young etc., etc…”

Some design notes: test specimens are back but with a different look (wider more detailed eyes). Minotaurs have also returned but are also very different looking from previous incarnations. Also, airplanes and sun appear in several panels.

Song 7 of Jonny Greenwood’s Bodysong soundtrack is titled “Nudnik Headache.” Nudnik is a word from Yiddish that means “someone who is a boring pest.”

The title of the album’s last song is “Tehellet,” a word for which I cannot find a precedent.

The following is excerpted from an email Patrick Brereton sent to me in February 2004:

“In Message 65, you discuss the line “I float down the Liffey” from How to Disappear Completely in relation to Joyce’s ‘Finnegan’s Wake’, which i found interesting. When i first heard the line, my reaction was also to think of Joyce, but in relation to ‘Ulysses’ – particularly The Wandering Rocks chapter in which Bloom tosses a flier with the message ‘Elijah is Coming’ (or something along those lines) into the Liffey. Then throughout the chapter you read the flier’s vantage point as it floats down the Liffey. (Joyce actually investigated the currents of the river to determine where the paper would be located along the river at the various times that the chapter encapsulates…)”

Thom Yorkes writes: “It was entirely in the public interest to question the construction of this intelligence report, even if done rather shakily at 6.07am. That is what public service broadcasting should be about, serving no proprietor, not controlled by the state, and addressing the concerns of those who pay for its existence. This is exactly what the Today programme did in this instance. So where was the mistake?” Read more here.

Below are direct links to the Radiohead.tv episodes. These are large files (approx. 100 megabytes each) that may be downloaded and saved to your computer as well:

• Episode 1 (93.2 mb)
• Episode 2 (94.1 mb)
• Episode 3 (83.6 mb)

The above links were found via videos.antville.org. Another link found via videos.antville.org: the video for Knives Out.

UPDATE, 1/30/05: the above links are dead.

I would like to publish on Pulk-Pull* a review and/or other comments on the performance Radiohead did with Merce Cunningham. If any readers would like to contribute, please email joseph@pulk-pull.org.

Thom Yorke wants to know where 28 pages went (RealOne Player required). Those 28 pages are mentioned in a CBS News article. The missing pages (as reported here) are said to deal “with Saudi Arabia’s links to terrorism.” The report is available in full (minus 28 pages of course) here.

Stanley Donwood is a bit worried. The soundtrack would be: CNN CNN CNN CNN.