Details regarding sales of Radiohead "In Rainbows" were released at the “You Are in Control” conference in Iceland, including the fact that the album has sold more than 3 million worldwide.
Warner Chappell’s Head of Business Affairs Jane Dyball delivered the keynote address and noted, among other things, that the digital publishing income from just the first license (for the Radiohead pay what you want site) dwarfed all the band’s previous digital publishing income.
OTHER STATS
• The physical CD has sold 1.75 million to date.
• 100,000 boxsets have been sold via W.A.S.T.E.
• Nearing 17 million plays on last.fm
• 1.2 million fans will see the tour
• The digital income from the experiment made a material difference to Warner Chappell’s U.K. digital revenue this year

Music :) Ally has details; Pitchfork has its own take.

Clement Picon was among the four who won the In Rainbows Animated Music Video Contest. Here's his video for "Reckoner."

Radiohead - Reckoner - by Clement Picon

by Stuart Oldham

After months of touring the globe, you'd think that Radiohead would be holed up in their Oxford homes, sipping tea and talking politics on a much deserved break. According to BBC 6, that's not entirely the case.
Speaking to BBC 6 Music, Radiohead bassist Colin Greenwood reveals that the band is heading to the studio "in the near future" to record their eighth full-length LP. "We’ve finished the main bulk of it (tour)and we’re off to Japan in a couple of weeks to finish it off."
Guitarist Ed O'Brien was sitting in as well: “We're still talking about doing some stuff and we’re really excited about it. First we came off tour to do some writing and we wanted to just carry on doing it because it was so brilliant."
It's uncertain whether or not veteran Radiohead producer Nigel Godrich will be behind the soundboard, but after Godrich was spotted on and off-stage during the band's recent North American tour, the chances of a reunion are likely.
Radiohead are scheduled to play Japan this October.

Tour Dates:

10/1/08 Municipal Central Gymnasium Osaka, Japan 
10/2/08 Municipal Central Gymnasium Osaka, Japan 
10/4/08 Saitama Super Arena Tokyo, Japan 
10/5/08 Saitama Super Arena Tokyo, Japan

Post by Matt Kivel

A large portion of this week's Set List content has been devoted to a dynamic, locally-run Los Angeles festival called the F Yeah Fest. Each year, the promoters and festival operators generously give their money, time and effort to the maintenance and  independence  of the  F Yeah brand -- often receiving little  to no recompense for their tireless work. So it saddens me to report that those same, well-meaning festival volunteers were attacked outside of Radiohead's Hollywood Bowl performance Monday night.

The harrowing scene is depicted vividly in Randall Roberts' report for the LA Weekly.

Basically, F Yeah Fest  founder Sean Carlson, promoter Phil Hoelting  and  filmmaker Robert Reich were  allegedly stationed outside of the Bowl Monday night, distributing flyers for the weekend festival when they caught site of a grizzly altercation between Bowl security and a concertgoer. Reich -- who was filming the scene  for an upcoming F Yeah documentary -- captured much of the action on camera. What followed was a disturbing chase down Highland Blvd, in which Carlson and Reich were physically attacked by security guards. The tape was confiscated and the young men were left bruised and bewildered -- Carlson's cell phone and keys were stolen.

A sad situation to say the least. If any Set List readers witnessed this event, please leave your account in the comments section.

posted by Stuart Oldham

Radiohead completed their two-night residency at the Hollywood Bowl on Monday with a dazzling two and half hour set, which featured signature tracks from "In Rainbows," their latest album, as well as a Neil Young cover ("Tell Me Why") and hits from "The Bends" and "OK Computer."

Lead-singer Thom Yorke was in good spirits throughout the night, dancing on stage in bright red pants and telling the audience at one point: "Hello in the way back! We're the tiny people on stage. Especially me!"

The second encore began with Yorke fumbling "Cymbal Rush" by himself on piano (He stopped mid-way through with a chuckle and advised the audience to "Shhhhh!" before completing the song.) The rest of the band (Ed O'Brien, Phil Selway, Colin Greenwood and Jonny Greenwood) then joined for fan-favorites "Karma Police" and "Idioteque" to close out the show.

The Liars, local art-rockers from Los Angeles, opened the concert with a tapered 30-minute set.

Radiohead plays San Diego on Wednesday night before heading to the Santa Barbara Bowl on Thursday for the final stop of their current U.S. Tour.

Full set list:

Reckoner/Optimistic/There There/15 Step/All I Need/Pyramid Song/Weird Fishes/Arpeggi/The Gloaming/Videotape/Talk Show Host/Faust Arp/Tell Me Why*/No Surprises/Jigsaw Falling Into Place/The Bends/The National Anthem/Nude/Bodysnatchers/Encore: House of Cards/Planet Telex/Go Slowly/Fake Plastic Trees/True Love Waits Intro/Everything In Its Right Place** Encore 2: Cymbal Rush/Karma Police/Idioteque

* = Neil Young cover featuring Jonny Greenwood and Thom Yorke on acoustic guitars

** = Thom sings two minutes of "True Love Waits" on a sustained dark organ before launching into "Everything In Its Right Place"

(Photos by sweetcell)

(posted by Stuart Oldham)

In an interview with BBC 6 Music, 'Fight Club' author Chuck Palahniuk revealed that Radiohead would be contributing music to the forthcoming adaptation of his book, "Choke."

The film, starring Sam Rockwell and Anjelica Huston, has already played at Sundance and will be released this fall via Fox Searchlight.

"Clark Gregg (director) knew that I’d written Choke while listening to Radiohead’s Pablo Honey, with "Creep," over and over and over," Palahniuk said.

"So he (Gregg) got Radiohead to contribute a song; to write a song for the very end of the movie, the final credits. Apparently Radiohead liked the movie so much, they’ve written the score, most of the ambient music throughout it. So it’s ‘Choke – with the music of Radiohead."

The Oxford quintet are no strangers to movie soundtracks (Vanilla Sky, Romeo and Juliet and A Scanner Darkly) yet only guitarist/composer Jonny Greenwood has actually scored a film. (Paul Thomas Anderson's 'There Will Be Blood')

'Choke' will be released in the U.S. on September 26.

UPDATE: It appears that Mr. Palahniuk misspoke about the project. Radiohead will NOT be scoring the film, according to music supervisors from 'Choke.' Instead, the band's song 'Reckoner' from In Rainbows will be played over the credits.

Thom Yorke of Radiohead, left, - 8/01/08
(Photo by Angeline Vuong/Variety)

Setlist:
01. 15 Step
02. Airbag
03. There There
04. All I Need
05. Nude
06. Arpeggi
07. The Gloaming
08. The National Anthem
09. Faust Arp
10. No Surprises
11. Jigsaw Falling Into Place
12. Reckoner
13. Lucky
14. The Bends
15. Everything In Its Right Place
16. Fake Plastic Trees
17. Bodysnatchers

• Day Two Photos - Lollapalooza
• Day One Photos - Lollapalooza

Story by Matt Kivel

The boys of Radiohead are anything but bashful when it comes to embracing the internet and new media. Whether it be posts on the group's Dead Air Space blog, their first live performance of 2008 streaming online, the Scotch Mist New Year's Eve Videos and their well-documented you-name-it pricing scheme for In Rainbows ... Yorke and Co have been generous to their legions of internet savy fans.

Their latest is a series of videos made recently available via Itunes' Music Store. Filmed on a single day with Nigel Godrich's From The Basement crew, the videos capture Radiohead performing a handful of In Rainbows songs in an intimate setting.   

Morgan Freeman finally gets his "In Rainbows" box set!

Radiohead opened their US. tour at the Cruzan Amphitheatre in West Palm Beach, Fla., on Monday. They played:
All I Need / Bodysnatchers  / There There / Reckoner / The Gloaming / Morning Bell / Nude / How To Disappear Completely / 15 Step / Weird Fishes>Arpeggi / Idioteque / Bulletproof…I Wish I Was / Where I End And You Begin / Airbag / Everything In Its Right Place / The National Anthem / Videotape / Optimistic
/ Just / Faust Arp / Exit Music (for a film)  / Bangers + Mash / House of Cards / Street Spirit
The Reviews:
Rolling Stone
Pitchfork
Palm Beach Post
New York Times

Radiohead in August: Three festivals, five California shows, two different opening acts and one on on-sale date. The second leg of the  North American tour:

Aug. 1 - Lollapalooza - Chicago
3 - Verizon Wireless Music Center - Indianapolis
4 - Blossom Music Center - Cleveland
6 - Parc Jean Drapeau - Montreal
8/9 - All Points West Music & Arts Festival/Liberty State Park -
Jersey City, N.J.
12 - Susquehanna Bank Center - Camden, N.J.
13 - Tweeter Center For the Performing Arts - Mansfield, Mass.
15 - Molson Amphitheatre - Toronto
19 - Thunderbird Stadium - Vancouver, B.C.
20 - White River Amphitheatre - Auburn, Wash.
22 - Outside Lands Music & Arts Festival @ Golden Gate Park -
San Francisco
24/25  Hollywood Bowl
27 - Cricket Wireless Amphitheatre - Chula Vista, Calif.
28 - Santa Barbara Bowl - Santa Barbara, Calif.

With the exception of the festivals (Lollapalooza, All Points West,
Outside Lands), pre-sales  begin Wednesday with general on-sale on Saturday.
Grizzly Bear will open  Aug. 3-15 and  Liars plat Aug. 19-28.

They had already announced the cities; now they have dates and venues.

Mon 05/05/08   West Palm Beach, Fla.  Cruzan Amphitheatre   

Tue 05/06/08   Tampa, Fla.  Ford Amphitheatre @ State Fairgrds.   

Thu 05/08/08   Atlanta  HiFi Buys Amphitheatre   

Fri 05/09/08   Charlotte, N.C.  Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre   

Sun 05/11/08   Bristow, Va.  Nissan Pavilion At Stone Ridge   

Wed 05/14/08   Maryland Heights, Mo.  Verizon Wireless Amph. St. Louis   

Sat 05/17/08   The Woodlands, Texas  The Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion   

Sun 05/18/08   Dallas  Superpages.com Centre

The other cities are: Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Indianapolis, Los Angeles, Montreal, New York, Philadelphia, San Diego, San Francisco, Santa Barbara, Seattle, Toronto and Vancouver, B.C.

Radiohead's "In Rainbows" has secured a worldwide release date and a label in the U.S.
The date: Dec. 31
U.S. label: TBD, an imprint owned by ATO that was formerly called Side One
Japan label: Hostess
Rest of the World: XL
First single: Jigsaw Falling Into Place
Release to radio: Jan. 14

On a Radiohead website, Thom Yorke quotes Robert Wyatt in explaining the way he works. "I love pop music to death..... Most great composers rely on folk music. I rely on pop music."
Wyatt, a brilliant art-rock singer whose drumming career ended after a fall out a window left him paralyzed from the waist down, has never received his due, even when he created the U.K. chart-topper, "Shipbuilding," which Elvis Costello wrote for him in the early '80s. One of the most convincing alchemists in the world of musicians whose gentle and warm pop music features bits of jazz and improvisation and sparse instrumentation, he's the rare artist capable of creating solo works - his 2003 album "Cuckooland" continues to amaze - 30-plus years after making career-defining works ("Rock Bottom," "Ruth is Stranger Than Richard"). He is in the small club - maybe the only member? - of people who have collaborated with two of England's guitar greats, Fred Frith and David Gilmour.
Steve Hochman wrote an interesting interview/review hybrid for the L.A. Times last week on Wyatt and his latest album, "Comicopera."

Do no web editors or critics feel any responsibility to review the MUSIC on Radiohead's "In Rainbows," released within the last 20 hours as a digital download?
Considering the sturm und drang of Internet pontificators, not to mention the global standing O that their decision to self-release received, it would seem that the world would be dying to give their opinion of the album. To use the words of the legendary sports talkshow host Lee "Hacksaw" Hamilton: "Where are you Pitchfork Media?"
Since, Pitchfork has yet to review the actual album, we have searched high and low (no, not dry) for the praise of other indie rock crix. There's not too much out there as the album becomes nearly a day old.
The Times of London noted: "Its airless, bunker-bound anti-ambience recalls Kid A and Amnesiac, but the band themselves sound thrillingly alive, thrashing out a melody replicates on “real” instruments the gorgeous Cornish digi-folk of Aphex Twin’s Richard D. James – an album for which Radiohead have all been vocal in their affection."
A Wired blog writer says it gets better with each listen and Stereogum, rather than reviewing, chose to let readers post.
Rolling Stone spoke with Jonny Greenwood on the day Radiohead changed the world.
And good old-fashioned Variety posted a glowing review.

This giving away music thing is getting contagious in England. The Charlatans, a fine band that found few Yanks interested in their reunion a couple years back (they played pretty good in the rain at SXSW),  has a catch involved with their free music; and Madness is eyeing the move, too, though no one is quite sure who asked them. In a story that clearly involved a reporter asking a music industry professional whether bands without contracts, say Oasis and Jamiroquai , might consider  going the free download route, the answer was  an unqualified "yes."

Radiohead is making history, or at least writing another chapter in artists taking control of their work. Off the top of my head, some landmarks:
In 1951, Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball created Desilu to produce and own “I Love Lucy” instead of CBS, thereby inventing the Hollywood filmed TV business..
In 1959, Ray Charles tells Ahmet Ertegun he wants to own his own master recordings and the publishing. When Ertegun’s Atlantic Records stands firm with its no, a desperate ABC-Paramount sign him to a deal, giving in to all his wishes. Any act that doesn’t follow that pattern ultimately regrets it.
The  Beatles create Apple Records in 1968 and soon thereafter the Rolling Stones follow suit. No act has as firm a control on their catalog as those two.
Ani DiFranco creates her own label, Righteous Babe Records, in Buffalo, N.Y., and after she releases about seven albums — 1997 or so — her name gets bandied about not because she has built a fan base or makes artistically brilliant music. She  was in the news - and pissed off by it - because she was seeing a profit of nearly $5 per CD sold, a rate that dwarfed the amount made even by major stars. In the dot-com era, CDbaby.com has made a living selling music by the folks following her model; Pitchforkmedia.com has become a critical clearinghouse writing about those acts.
On Oct. 1, Radiohead announces that its next album will be released in three stages, beginning with a digital download version for which each consumer decides what they will pay. Cost of recording, marketing and distribution are covered by the band. It’s a risk, but it eliminates a collection of steps. This is a true downsizing of the business, but one that, if navigated properly, brings fans closer to the artist. The music website Stereogum, which has been around about half as long as Radiohead, declared it the coolest thing a band has ever done.
As much as the Radiohead news was greeted with praise for its decision to go DIY, they have not truly created a model for the future. This is an enormously popular band that only continues to grow commercially. And as they have done in the past, Radiohead is controlling the way their music gets leaked; years ago, the band sent out review cassettes in a Walkman that had been glued shut.
The band has an enormous fan base  that buys into everything the band releases – and that’s the true rarity. (Just thinking out loud: could Beck pull this off? Is this a better option than what Starbucks offers acts? If you're establish and flush, how soon does one need to recoup their investment?)
Radiohead struck at the right time — when fans are still clamoring for new music and musical heroes are few and far between. And in contrast to the major labels and the RIAA, which got a jury to rule Thursday that a woman owed them $200K for making her music collection available online, they look like the good guys. They’re there for the fans.
The move, though, does not herald the imminent decline of the music labels as we know them. Radiohead is in a unique place. And while much of that is based on music, there has been a corporate outfit – EMI’s Capitol Records – marketing, publicizing and selling their six albums. Radiohead did not happen overnight and there is no act that has ascended to similar heights in the last 30 years without a major label behind them.
Not that I am jumping on some pro-EMI bandwagon here. Sold recently to a private investment house whose leader blamed  EMI’s troubles on its seven-year focus on a merger with Warner Music rather than releasing and supporting top-notch music, EMI has been cut to the bone in staffing. Leadership is an important commodity at a label: Capitol broke Radiohead and Coldplay in the boyband era; it is struggling with Interpol (200,000 in sales from a July release) in an age when everyone is thirsty for great indie rock.
Radiohead’s move is about half as significant as that of Brother Ray and if it becomes a future template for the music business, we will forever wallow in a sea of Pussycat Dolls imitations, novelty rap and variations on whatever last year’s surprise hit might have been. Once a year, we’ll have a Kanye vs. 50 type square off and everyone will lament that they don’t make music like they used to  and long for the days of Blues Traveler and Hootie.
Radiohead's move will be an exception to the rule and labels may grow increasingly reticent to sign bands looking forward to the day they become free agents.
The windows for bands like Radiohead to get signed and receive support while they develop seem to close at every turn. Rap, R&B, country — the acts that get signed in those genres are the ones that look ready to make hits, not someone who is three albums and five years away from a hit.
During rock’s album heyday — “Highway 61 Revisited” through “OK Computer” — labels had two agendas: Create catalog titles and create stars. As it shifts back to a song-driven business, as it was from 1900s to the late ‘50s, there is little motivation for labels to attempt to develop an act like Radiohead from the ground up. It used to be a Warner Music specialty; now it has been virtually abandoned at the music group.
Countless acts have experimented in the way Radiohead is now – expecially with live albums. But having to watch over the business and finance a recording can be a burdensome task. They eventually return to the label old even if it means the indie route.
Nearly four  years ago, Peter Gabriel and Brian Eno announced the creation of  Magnificent Union of Digitally Downloading Artists at the Midem conference in Cannes.
"Unless artists quickly grasp the possibilities that are available to them, then the rules will get written, and they'll get written without much input from artists," Eno said at the time.
What Gabriel and Eno envisioned was star artists stepping out of the album format and releasing EPs, demos, single songs, even sketches of songs. At the time they said this was not an alternative to label deals, just a way for musicians to take control and release music they way they see fit.
But it is obviously easier said than done: We’re still waiting for Gabriel and Eno to take advantage of digital possibilities — beyond quietly using their own websites. Radiohead will get the nod as the innovator.