Airbag
Studio version -
Solo Coachella '10 -
Belfort '98 -
Heroic, anthemic, explosive, Airbag is the opener of all openers upon the album of all albums. It's place in their career is a groundbreaking landmark, a new oil has been struck and will be tapped into from this point on in their career - although not one single aspect of the band could account for such a ramp up in quality, be it their whittling down to Nigel Godrich being the sole production influence, their tendency to want to escape their own sound, increased musical chops or sheer added wisdom, the band dynamic has assimilated newfound confidence AND freedom - one of the most difficult combos to achieve in writing music. What potential Pablo Honey and The Bends hinted at Airbag brazenly blows out of the water, immediately kicking the listeners ass and displaying entirely new structural concepts for every member's role in this band's sound, while retaining the same instrumental role as a 3-guitar rock and roll band (for the most part).
The song opens on E one note ahead of the beat before shifting into a distorted lullabye revolving modally on Fmajor and Amajor, Jonny's guitar alone would leave it a little dark and empty but the backing cello combines to give it a velvety, smoky character and the sleigh bells have got to be tongue-in-cheek but totally effective to Thom's idea of the song being about the intense feeling of relief and joy you get right after a near death experience. The bells evoke the wonder of christmas magic, perhaps George's revelation that an angel just got its wings and he truly does have a wonderful life and he doesn't wish he was dead after all. Ed's bristling guitar line arrives suspiciously at bar 7, Phil's manipulated jam snippet arrives at bar 11, and having the distinct advantage of knowing the song as a musically inept 14 year-old I can say that if even if you had no idea where to start counting, his intro in no way sounds unnatural. Alternatively, you could say the first E starts on the fourth beat of the first bar or it simply is the first bar and the bells/cello begin on the second bar, that way Ed technically starts at 8 and Phil starts at bar 12. Regardless, it's a conscious edit on the band's part to start the song on an off beat/bar. What they're doing A. coloring outside the lines, B. throwing you off, and C. subconsciously planting the seed that something is indeed different about this band - at 23 years of age I now note that Ed starts exactly on the ten second mark (OK Computer's working title was "Zeroes and Ones" for a long time, furthering the idea that Radiohead construct their music with respect and affinity for maths).
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