Thom Yorke Unveils Solo Single, Jonny Greenwood Talks MP3s, and More

Every time I try to write a Radiohead news post today, another bit comes across my screen, so let’s drop some info in one fell swoop, shall we?

First off, we’re grateful to our buddy Brock Thiessen over at Exclaim, who gave us a helpful heads-up on his scoop that Thom Yorke will release a limited 12” solo single for the songs “Apart By Horses” and “The Hollow Earth” later this month. We were the second site on the Internet to report on the story and many followed suit, adding a question mark to the title. Well, drop those ?s, folks, ‘cause Thom Yorke confirmed the news at Dead Air Space this morning and you can pre-order your copy (digital download included) here.

Also, Sasha Frere-Jones interviewed Jonny Greenwood in the second installment of his “Dithering series in The New Yorker. Greenwood’s opinions on MP3s, FLACs, and “thirty-something men who lurk in hi-fi shops” are predictably fascinating. Not only is he a fan of the compressed audio file format, but Greenwood even asserts that they have a “helpful crunchiness.” I’ve got a whole rant about audio quality, live music, and the Tascam 246 rarin’ to go, but I’ll save that sort of madness for the weekend. Check out the interview thataway.

Now let’s get back to Thom Yorke: according to Billboard (via The Daily Swarm), Yorke is planning a possible string of live dates for later this year and they are… drum roll… “potentially his first with a band other than Radiohead.” That’s cool, but if he replaces Jonny with Dave Navarro, I may have to only cover Thom Yorke news every other day.