Playing tracks that spanned their history, the band played a set that was sure to please all fans in attendance, from the diehards around for the release of The Bends to the new breed of indie rockers jumping on board with In Rainbows. Their focus indeed on the latter, however, playing the album in its entirety, interspersed with older fan favorites and even a little Neil Young, just for good measure.
Even for his lack of conventional dialogue and interaction with the audience, frontman Thom Yorke was more engagingly animated and visually commanding than ever before, showing that even for all their big budget stage show, they haven’t lost sight of the fact that sometimes less is indeed more. Even for the one technical difficulty in his otherwise vocally flawless set, Yorke played it off with a charm that left no doubt he was in control of his stage.
From opening song “Reckoner” to “There There” to “Nude” to the epically soaring “Everything in its Right Place” for the close of their first encore, the singles, of course, drew the biggest fan response, but even the less familiar tracks seemed to still have the audience enthralled. Returning for a second and final encore with “Karma Police” and “Idioteque,” the Oxfordshire natives closed their show with the only appropriate songs and stated unequivocally that the only thing that can top Radiohead these days is whatever they’re planning next.