​Radiohead Reveal How Alanis Morissette Helped Them Make 'OK Computer'

BY Sarah MurphyPublished May 31, 2017

Radiohead's seminal album OK Computer is about to celebrate its 20th anniversary — and it turns out Alanis Morissette deserves some credit for making the album happen in the first place.
 
Fans may know that the Canadian star invited the UK band to open for her 1996 Jagged Little Pill tour, but in a new interview with Rolling Stone, Radiohead have reflected on the impact that gig had on the album that followed.
 
The unlikely tour invite came because Morissette "loved every bass line, every keyboard note, every beautiful note hit by Thom" on 1995's The Bends — but apparently her fans were less receptive to Radiohead's music.
 
Still unable to shake the feeling that the crowd couldn't wait for them to get off the stage, multi-instrumentalist Jonny Greenwood recently told Rolling Stone, "My main memory of that tour is playing interminable hand-organ solos to an audience full of quietly despairing teenage girls."
 
Instead of trying to win over the young female fans, Radiohead displayed their own brand of quiet despair by testing out songs that would eventually appear on OK Computer, like "Karma Police," "Let Down" and "Paranoid Android."
 
"We were well adept at playing to people that didn't give a rat's ass about us," frontman Thom Yorke said. "I used to quite enjoy it. People are sitting down to their chicken dinners. We were trying to get them to choke on the bones."
 
The method behind the madness clearly paid off in the long run. As previously reported, the band will release a huge 20th anniversary reissue package in honour of OK Computer on June 23 via XL Recordings.
 
Morissette's Jagged Little Pill isn't doing too badly all these year later, either. It was just revealed that a musical adaptation of the record will be hitting the stage next year.
 
For further insight on the making of OK Computer, head over here to read Rolling Stone's full feature story.

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