Idioteque

"Idioteque" is a song by the English rock band Radiohead, released on their fourth album, ''Kid A'' (2000). Radiohead developed it while experimenting with modular synthesisers. It contains samples of two 1970s computer music compositions.

"Idioteque" was named one of the best songs of the decade by ''Pitchfork'' and ''Rolling Stone''. In 2021, ''Rolling Stone'' ranked it number 48 on their list of the " 500 Greatest Songs of All Time".

A live version appears on the 2001 album '' I Might Be Wrong: Live Recordings''. "Idioteque" was included on '' Radiohead: The Best Of'' (2008).

Recording

The Radiohead singer, Thom Yorke, described "Idioteque" as "an attempt to capture that exploding beat sound where you're at the club and the PA's so loud, you know it's doing damage".

The song began with an electronic rhythm created by Jonny Greenwood. Greenwood created a drum machine using synthesiser modules similar to those available in the 1970s, using components such as filters to create and shape sounds. Feeling the rhythm "needed chaos", he experimented with found sounds and sampling. He recorded 50 minutes of improvisation and gave it to Yorke, who took a short sequence and used it to write the song. Yorke said: "Some of it was just 'what?', but then there was this section of about 40 seconds long in the middle of it that was absolute genius, and I just cut that up."

As with other songs on ''Kid A'', Yorke created lyrics by cutting up phrases and drawing them from a hat. In the second chorus, his vocals are rearranged so that he seems to say "the first of the children" in 5/4, creating a grouping dissonance against the original 4/4 chorus.

Samples

Greenwood could not remember where the four-chord synthesiser phrase had come from, and assumed he had played it himself. He later realised he had sampled it from , a computer music piece by the American composer Paul Lansky. Lansky wrote during 197374 at Princeton University on an IBM mainframe computer using Music 360 and FM synthesis. It was released on the 1976 compilation ''Electronic Music Winners'', which Greenwood discovered in a second-hand record shop while Radiohead were touring the US.

Lansky allowed Radiohead to use the sample after Greenwood wrote to him with a copy of "Idioteque". In an essay about the experience, Lansky wrote that he found Radiohead's use of the sample "imaginative and inventive" and that he had himself "sampled" the chord progression by using the Tristan chord. "Idioteque" also samples another composition from ''Electronic Music Winners'', "Short Piece", by Arthur Kreiger, who became a professor of music at Connecticut College.

Reception

The critic Simon Reynolds wrote that "Idioteque" "does for the modern dance what PiL and Joy Division's ' She's Lost Control' did for disco. Call it bleak house or glum 'n' bass, but the track works through the contrast between Yorke's tremulous hyperemotionality and the rigid grid of rhythm." Keith Cameron of ''NME'' wrote that despite its "naff" title and "gauche" attempt at creating "garage-noir", "Idioteque" was "a nonetheless brilliantly persuasive two-step litany of paranoia, fear and unease. Yorke sings it like he means it."

Tom Ewing of ''Freaky Trigger'' dismissed "Idioteque" as a "plain awful, a piss-poor" imitation of the 1999 Aphex Twin track '" Windowlicker", with "Yorke yammering excruciatingly over the top". However, the Rock's Backpages reviewer Barney Hoskyns wrote that while "Idioteque" was arguably too derivative of Aphex Twin, it contributed "something irresistibly powerful to the phex Twintemplate". Brent DiCrescenzo of ''Pitchfork'' wrote that it "clicks and thuds like Aphex Twin and Bjork's ''Homogenic'', revealing brilliant new frontiers for the 'band'." The '' Q'' reviewer Stuart Maconie wrote that listeners expecting a "cheesy ATB-style trance anthem" would be disappointed by the "whiny, metallic attack" and anxious refrain, resulting in a song that is "about as uplifting as Mandrax".

"Idioteque" was named the eighth-best song of the decade by ''Pitchfork'' and the 56th-best by ''Rolling Stone''. In 2018, ''Rolling Stone'' ranked it the 33rd-greatest song of the century so far. In 2021 and 2024, ''Rolling Stone'' ranked "Idioteque" number 48 on its lists of the " 500 Greatest Songs of All Time", describing it as "the foreboding, spellbinding centrepiece of ''Kid A''".

Personnel

Credits adapted from liner notes.

* Jonny Greenwood – modular synthesiser, sampling
* Thom Yorke – vocals
* Nigel Godrich – production, engineering, mixing
* Radiohead – production
* Gerard Navarro – production assistance, additional engineering
* Graeme Stewart – additional engineering
* Chris Blair – mastering

Other versions

A live version appears on the 2001 album '' I Might Be Wrong: Live Recordings''. The drummer, Philip Selway, said Radiohead wanted to "give that sense of the electronic in the piece" while performing with live instruments, and that this changed how he approached drum parts.

In July 2010, Amanda Palmer released a cover of "Idioteque" as the first single from her Radiohead covers album. It was National Public Radio's Song of the Day for January 11, 2011. In 2010, Yoav used a loop pedal to build a layered acoustic version.

References

External links

Radiohead Official Site
explanation by the composer of the song's relationship with his piece ''mild und leise'', including a sample of it.

{{Authority control

2000 songs
Radiohead songs
Song recordings produced by Nigel Godrich
Songs written by Thom Yorke
Songs written by Colin Greenwood
Songs written by Jonny Greenwood
Songs written by Philip Selway
Songs written by Ed O'Brien
Songs about climate change
Electronica songs
Ambient techno songs
UK garage songs