Originally
released: June
2001
Found on: Amnesiac
Also found on: (live) I Might Be Wrong - Live Recordings
The studio version of "Like Spinning Plates" was built
over the backing track of an unreleased song, "I Will,"
played backwards.
From
Jam!: Machine-gun quick, turntable-scratch-like noises, and what
sounds like backwards guitar notes define the rhythm, while Yorke's
voice sounds distorted, like the creepy dwarf from "Twin Peaks."
Is it about the hubbub of a musician's lifestyle finally starting
to wind down to a more manageable pace? Or is the spinning plate
Yorke sings about actually the fragile balance of the world about
to come crashing down?
Colin: The ominous tones of Like Spinning Plates. In Copenhagen,
I was listening to Woman’s Hour [popular BBC Radio 4 programme].
They were talking about this English composer, whose name I can’t
remember, who wrote a piece of music for a singer where all the
phrasings were backward but she sung it forward. Thom sung the backwards
melody. It was recorded forward then listened to backwards and he
did the phrasing so as to create backward sounding words but its
sung forwards. It’s kind of my favourite track.
|