October 25th 2024 - Auckland Night 1 Review: In Which I Gush Unapologetically

It's the morning after my first show. I wake up and consider that I've just seen one of the best performances of my life.

I decide this needs some serious, overwrought reflection, and head out into a windy Auckland in an almost-warm-enough Radiohead hoodie. As I pass through the streets, I spot plenty of Thom Yorke shirts out in the wild. This feels good. Right now, in this liminal tour-space, I'm surrounded by people on the same page as me; the ones who want to get lost in these songs, to take every bit of emotional honesty Thom puts out on stage and drink it in.

There is a lot to process, and for this I will need coffee. I make way into Auckland's interesting bit, and park myself at a trendy cafe.

I think back to last night.

We are seated to jazz, an intimate, friendly hall of Yorke aficionados. I have a Zine on my lap, and flip through it like I'm at the theatre. The vibe in the room is unlike other shows I've been to. It's not Radiohead, or anything else really. There's a hushed closeness to the way people shuffle into their rows of chairs, to how they filter in and see the array of equipment on stage, an obtuse laboratory of sound.

The show begins with a slow build of synths. Thom walks out without ceremony, as if this is everyday. Maybe it is for him. The crowd cheers as he sits at the piano; he starts to play.

Please excuse me but I've got to ask, are his first words that night, and the audience is endlessly accommodating, sitting in rapt awe. Someone loses their shit, and there's a brief woo of uncontained excitement, quickly muffled. It seems everyone here knows the value of what they are witnessing.

Thom moves through the set, and I quickly realise it's completely different to what was played the other night in Christchurch. The thrill that anything could happen sets in.

A few notes on the guitar and oh, I know this song. He's playing Let Down. Is that right? Is he really playing a solo acoustic version of Let Down? By the time I've processed that yes he is, he's messed up the lyrics and 'ah that's the wrong fucking verse', to a round of fond laughter.

We forgive him his mistakes, as they're endearing and very humanising. The space in the hall feels smaller and closer than before.

His voice is gorgeous, vulnerable and penetrating. It seems so effortless for him to do this. He flows from song to song, while moving between his machines like a diligent lab technician.

There are moments during the guitar songs that are haunted by Jonny and the others. Perhaps as I've seen the band live, it's there in my mind. I can hear them playing their parts -- and yet Thom feels whole in his presence on stage. This isn't Radiohead, it's something else. The energy tonight is all Thom, and apparently there's an abundance of it.

You know where you are, rises up through the room, and the crowd murmurs in response, feeling it.

He's only on the second song and I already feel like this is one of the best shows I've seen.

The visuals are an art installation in themselves, and I could easily spend the whole show gazing at those dancing lights. For Last I Heard the wall behind Thom is awash with blue shapes, coalescing and cascading, almost forming into something but not quite. It's easy to get lost in the sound and the music, until Thom shifts gears at one of his machines and pulls us all into a new direction, and once again I'm startled to look back down at the stage and see his small silhouetted figure bending over sequencers, pushing buttons and twiddling knobs. He's right there making this with us. Right there. I try to keep an eye on him, but he's deft, and has launched into Packt before I'm ready for it.

The drum machine hammers out that iconic beat, and the speakers rumble low. Thom grabs the mic and takes us all back to 2001. After years of waiting... well, after years of waiting, Thom Yorke came to our part of the world. There's no understating how much it means to everyone in this room to sit and watch these iconic songs. Most of us either never have the chance, or go to stupid lengths (me) to see whatever we can. This is an honour, and the crowd is fully aware.

Thinking about home, when I had left there'd apparently been a visit by the King to the Sydney Opera House, and the masses had gathered for a glimpse. It'll have nothing on Thom Yorke next weekend, I think.

And then out comes an acoustic guitar. Fake Plastic Trees is met with some intense joy. The cries from the audience are fond, like ‘you're amazing Thom’ and funnier, affectionate calls of, ‘get it Thom.’ There's a note of pride in these, of knowing what he's capable of and being in on it. Apart from that though, the entire hall is dead quiet, holding their breath. When the song finishes, the applause breaks out like a wave.

He goes straight into Truth Ray, and oh, this is a big one for me. Another false start here, and he's got to wrangle his synths into obedience. Yet again of course, he gets a round of applause for it. He can take us wherever he wants.

I watch the way he moves as he sings, strangely taut. There's so much emotion in this performance, in how his hands raise up to frame the words. Oh my God, oh my God, he sings, and we can see he's somewhere far away, translating this for us. Echoes on his vocals reverberate through the hall. I smile at myself, he's produced a tear with this one. Damn.

Make it stop, make it stop, he starts to sing at the end, and I'm swept up in feeling more than I bargained for.

He whispers to himself between songs, darting between machines, checking on his samples. I have no idea what he's doing or how he's doing it, but it's fascinating.

He's at the piano now, tinkling. Little cascades. Rippling over each other. Is it Bloom? No, not quite. And then he plays the opening chords of Unmade, and I make one of those embarrassing gasps of recognition. This is a favourite of mine, among favourites.

He sings, and the slow drawn out syllables of the word Unmade slip below my guard into somewhere I'd forgotten. He murmurs, come under my wings, and I feel tucked inside of this song, perfectly safe. I want to live here.

Between songs when my brain frees up enough of its allocation of attendant awe, I'm fervently glad I'm going to more of these. I couldn't stand this to be the last.

"Alright?" He says, incongruously casual, and moves into The Present Tense. This is also a big deal for me. I've seen him live many times with Radiohead and Atoms For Peace, and over the years I've always missed this song. One time I was pressed up at a wall in Munich hearing it during soundcheck, but I've never heard him play it live like this.

A soft clicking track gives it movement, as he plucks lightly through the guitar part. This reminds me more of that iconic Latitude version, further developed. It's pointless to describe how beautiful this is. You know. I will say there's such an intimacy in this room, full of all of us hearing how simple this arrangement is, just the beat, an electric guitar, and his voice tying it all together; yet there's an entire landscape of feeling here. I can't help but let it pull me along, caught in it.

And now, enough of that, it's time for a big electronic banger to wake us the fuck up. Not the News has me jerking my head around like those people on the train in the ANIMA video. This is somehow sharp and pointed, but softened by his voice. For this one, we really should have been standing.

Not done with that sort of thing, he queues up the heavy opening rumble of Hearing Damage, to quite a few screams of unbridled delight. Oh, they like this one. You can do no wrong in my eyes, which seems to be exactly what the crowd is thinking as the end of it melts away into electronic symphony.

The screens go blue, and the lights dance and Kid A starts. A few bars in, Thom adjusts a knob, and cuts back on the resonance, or whatever the right term is, the notes bouncing along cheekily for a bit, before he returns to business as usual. Some more of that deep rumble slides into the end of the song, and I'm having that moment, realising I'm experiencing Kid A, solo live. He hasn't done this before has he? Come on kids! Oh how badly I want to get up and dance to this.

Next up, the screens bleed red and Volk is happening. This track is a lot. Making great use of the huge speakers, Thom takes us through this one, into uncharted territory. The crowd is weirdly on board with it, and they should be - the immense, jagged synths cut through everything, the end in particular building up into a heavy electronic swell, ominous, huge and dangerous. Holy shit.

And then Videotape. The piano has a soft, warm tone, and Thom sings it close to the album, with a muted thump punctuating the beat. The crowd recognises Reckoner, and it's yet another pristine display of falsetto, with just an electric guitar behind it. That's all there is to the song, and yet it has immense presence.

We're then thrust into the full on wall of sound that signals the new Mark Pritchard collab, but Thom has to restart after a few seconds.

"You didn't notice that right? Ladies and gentlemen there is no computer on the stage."

And then, "Some of these bitches don't cooperate."

That's met with laughter, and we carry on.

This new song is my favourite bit of the set. It's a banger for sure, and when this releases I'll be playing the hell out of it. Back in the Game is stomping, dark, full of dangerous intensity. Thom is back in Skip Divided mode, and I'm all for it, though -- it's not really like anything he's done before. Of course.

The Clock is blistering, fast, chaotic. Thom uses an electric guitar here, to a clicking drum track. This takes me back to the Atoms For Peace shows, and I miss those with a sudden, sharp pang. Solo Thom is great, but so is the onstage interplay between world class musicians.

I'm not expecting the arrangement of All I Need that we hear next. All of the elements of the song are there, but reconstructed in their parts. I'm also fascinated by the massive white cube floating mysteriously behind Thom. When the piano comes in at the end, the crowd adores it, and just as on the album the whole thing builds up into a beautiful release. Thom exits the stage.

Everyone gets to their feet for a standing ovation, and after a moment, Thom reappears, and seems happy to see how receptive the crowd is. He tells us, as if doing an acceptance speech, that he wants to thank everyone he works with, but there's too many to list.

"I honestly fucking hate working alone," he says. And announces Cymbal Rush. This moves through stages of electronics, into Thom on piano again, and then a finale of layered electronic samples. Thom hunches over a machine and takes us right into the depths of bleep bloop territory, weaving it all together. I'm not sure what is required to produce this music, but I'm glad of everything that went into it, and of the people behind the scenes that have pulled together a seriously polished production, musically diverse, and like nothing I've heard before.

Everything in its Right Place is a total crowd pleaser. It strikes me as being quite close to the album. People do get up and dance in their seats here, and the room moves around to this Radiohead classic.

He tells us his name is Thom Yorke and it's been a pleasure. Well, obviously.

As he closes out the encore set with Lucky, the crowd sings along with him -- and sounds surprisingly good -- a gentle background harmony underneath his voice.

It's a memorable finale. As Thom reaches out to us with the climactic line, It's gonna be a glorious day, the crowd sighs happily in response. He throws in some Aaaahhs at the end of this, and it catches me off guard, though I really shouldn't be. They're high, delicate and clear, just one last taste of it.

His voice is fucking unreal and I refuse to get over this.

Post show, I'm left muttering to the people I'm with about how great that was. About all of the setlist surprises, how great Thom sounded, all of it. It's time to return to reality, though I suspect it will take a moment. Luckily I'm staying a few blocks away.

And now here I am, making sure I document every word, every gesture. I've seen several Radiohead shows since 2008, and one thing I've sincerely wished is that I had a full account of how I experienced the night. Video is good, yes, but I think writing it down like this will stand the test of time. Or it may be amusingly embarrassing. That's okay, it's honest.

Back home, a trusted agent (my mum) has acquired the Electric Lady Studios live record, and a few other things. I'm sent a brief video of the pop-up store, and of course it's decked out in blue Thom art, Reckoner is playing, and the whole space looks like a Radiohead pocket reality.

In another city, I've secured The Smile newspaper.

There really is a lot happening this week. Yesterday, I had a job interview in my hotel which maybe went okay, though I've now firmly deleted all that from my brain the same way I've removed Teams from my phone.

It's worth mentioning how much I love connecting with everyone over this music, gushing over how much these songs mean to us all. It's revitalising, and I'll go on from these shows with new energy.

It's also very clear just how much Thom enjoys performing, and he certainly took note of the entire room jumping to their feet after the main set, jubilant. It seems a good indicator of further shows around the world, and I can only hope for the rest of you out there that you have a chance to see this.

In a few hours I will do it all again.