Dear youse,
I'm getting up earlier and earlier at the moment - early enough to hear radio shows for farmers, which HAS to be some kind of warning sign.  First thing I do is check outside to see if it's windy enough to fly my kite for a few hours - I love that kind of morning....it's the only time I'm happy to own a Walkman.  I suppose I'm like this out of impatience - the albums done, the tours are planned, but nothing is actually happening.  I can't wait for the first concert: that's probably why I'm getting up so early..... I'm making it come sooner (does this make sense yet?)
If it's not the kite, it's the piano.  I've hired my first ever piano, a tiny one that sits in the corner, grinning.  It'd need far too much wind to fly very impressively, so I play it instead - nothing 'proper', but then I can't read more than one line of notes at a time - it amazes me how real pianists can. It's like reading two books at once.  How do you do it? I'm picking my way through a Messiaen thing, but at a snails pace.  I think I'll stick to guitar.
Jonny.
p.s. good kite-flying music - Chemical Brothers, Floyd's 'Meddle', and Radcliffe and Lard's Breakfast show.

    Hello, Colin here, writing just three days after we finished the new record.  It's been almost a year since we started work on it, and a year which has encompassed two tours in America as well as numerous festivals in Europe.
I'm off on holiday today, but last night I saw two very cool new bands, 'Travis' and 'Symposium'.  And in Oxford, too! The local club, the "zodiac", is applying for a building and bar extension, which would up the capacity to 600, in time for the Sound City music festival, which is happening in Oxford this September.  Sorry this is turning into a bit of a "local news" piece! For more 'Radiohead' news, well, the album's out in June, and expect the usual 'turning up somewhere near you and making a lot of noise' business at the end of summer.  We like the record very much, and hope you do too. love colinxxx.

    Dear Waster
Mental trade off... that time wasting game of my childhood, that says I will forgo the outcome of one event in favour of another.  Nick Hornby describes his trade off in Fever Pitch, where he's willing to forfeit a 2:1 degree for a lesser one, just so long as Arsenal win the championship.  They are completely futile indulgences.  Yet the other night a friend asked whether I would be willing to accept another Tory government in power in May, to ensure that Manchester Utd won the double of the premiership and the European Cup.  No way I thought, even with the prospect of being European Champions- that could happen another season- but another 5 years of the same government and this country would definitely go to the dogs.  But then I got thinking, the way new Labour are talking there is very little to distinguish between the 2 main parties.  Maybe things would not change that much, and Utd are in a great position.... the dilemma continues.  However if somebody had asked would you rather make an album that was musically OK, easy and quick to record, to an album that was musically better, yet more taxing and longer in the making, I'd instantly say NO! No question I'd always take the latter.  Ha ha ha ..... hope you're all well and see you soon.  Love Ed

T.O.O.T.R.G. To us (shamefully) for finishing an album.

    I recently heard a D.J. refer to 1997 as "Radiohead's comeback year", a slightly worrying comment as I've always associated such an event with Dinosaurs of Rock or the Bee Gees.  Anyway I wasn't aware that we'd been away.  Nonetheless, we're currently dusting down our chest wigs and buffing up our shiny white teeth because we're back.  The past six months have found us involved in a frank and civil exchange of fists over every single note of the new record.  The first bruises appeared in Jane Seymour's secluded house just outside Bath - a productive time but slightly too reminiscent of "The Shining" by the end.  After a short time in our manager's studio, we moved on to perfect our strangle holds in a brace of London studios.  Now, fully conversant in every form of verbal combat, we have produced an album of which I'm extremely proud.  I think it's the most accurate representation of us to date, and I really hope that you enjoy it.  Thanks for remaining interested, and hopefully we'll see you at a venue near you soon.
Love Philip xxxx

i want to be carried, heavily sedated
into a waiting aircraft.
i want to collapse from nervous exhaustion.  i want to bow my head like Samson
and bring down with me
the top ten advertising agencies.

i want to see the little bosses
vanish like harmless fairies.
i want the pantomime to be over,
the circus empty.

i want what is real to establish itself, my children to prevail,
to live happy ever after
in this world that worships the preposterous.

it is better to be a scribe
than hacking in the salt mines,
heaving the building blocks.
everybody wants to be a scribe.

but i want out.  i want non-existence,
a passive dream, a future for my children.

gavin ewart 'dream of a slave'

..we will see you soon.
love thom