Radiohead and Philosophy - Brandon W. Forbes [89]
Track two, “Sit down. Stand up” (Snakes and Ladders) evokes Auschwitz, with the command of the title, and “Walk into / The jaws of hell.” “The raindrops” could be gas. “2 + 2 = 5,” again, suggests that the thief in question might be the Devil of Dante’s Inferno who punishes those who betray others by having their souls sent to hell before they die. A demon inhabits their bodies for the rest of their life, while their souls are frozen in a lake right next to Satan, himself another punished soul. The tragedy here is that once you’re in, you’re in (and it’s much hotter than lukewarm): “It’s the devil’s way now / you can scream and you can shout / it is too late now.” In a way, your condemnation is just, because you’ve done it to yourself: “you have not been paying attention.”
From Hell, we go to human sacrifice. Track five “Go to Sleep” (Little Big Man being Erased) has instrumentation and structure reminiscent of the folk music from the cult film The Wicker Man (Robin Hardy, 1973) in which a virgin Christian policeman is burnt alive to appease the pagan gods and help the crops grow again. Each of these horrors, however, presupposes a certain easy metaphysics of the self, an easy division between ourselves and others (or “the Other,” evil itself).
The Most Gigantic Truthful Mouth of All Time
The disturbing collection of videos that accompanied Hail to the Thief, in the form of The Most Gigantic Lying Mouth of all Time, explore this conception of evil and the Devil. For those that see the Devil everywhere, the title could refer to Bush junior, and the videos are actually presented by a demonic figure with archteypal horns and an obfuscated devilish voice. It’s a parody of a number of genres, particularly the kids show and celebrity music program, with comments such as “if you would like to contact us write to us stating your age” and “all footage you’re about to see has been prewatched by adults.” The opening is akin to an episode of The Brady Bunch, with cheesy music and mug shots of the band, but with words such as “skinned alive,” “strung up by the wrists,” and “pointless” being flashed on the screen, we’d be forgiven for thinking this was purely an exercise in driving us deeper into a hole. A man holds up a sign saying “now we see you,” confirming our paranoia. Lyrics such as “ice age coming,” “this is really happening,” and “take the money and run,” suggest Yorke’s political and social paranoia.
To create The Most Gigantic Lying Mouth of all Time, Radiohead put out a general call for videos and selected their favorites, with the initial idea of having their own television channel. The videos are interspersed with “ironic” interviews with the band, but how ironic are they? After all the media hype over the politicization of the band’s music, Yorke reveals in two interviews that the best thing about being a celebrity is receiving free gasoline, although he did snog Robbie Williams and Richard Nixon. At least it’s only a snog not a shag. Can we conclude, like those who see the devil personified in politicians, that we only see what what we want to see, only hear what we want to hear? Ebba Frikzon’s “Cat Girl” video for “2 + 2 = 5” involves a cartoon rat teaching a class full of animals. The rat writes on the blackboard, “Today we are talking about animal rights.”
Our perceptions of evil, though, begin to change when we see our complicity in them. The significance of The Most Gigantic Lying Mouth is, in part, Radiohead’s participatory approach to their art—a move that prefigures both their pay-what-you-want model for marketing In Rainbows and, more broadly, their more optimistic, less apocalytpic view of the world after Hail to the Thief. Yorke perhaps had to go through the “Hail to the Thief ” stage to reach this point of activism. He got involved in Friends of the Earth in 2003, after the UN report on climate change was published, and decided to support their Big Ask campaign for a strong climate change