Radiohead has made the separate tracks for their new single “Nude” available and invited people to submit remixes. My brother Peter, who scores TV commercials for a living, has submitted a remix that’s hilarious if you know two things in advance:

• Radiohead lead guitarist Jonny Greenwood won the 2006 British Composer Awards prize for a classical piece titled Popcorn Superhet Receiver. This wasn’t some Liverpool Oratorio pop star attempt to move into “serious” territory by writing for a classical ensemble; he studied viola in his youth, served as the BBC’s composer in residence in 2004, and is considered to be somewhat of an expert on French composer Olivier Messiaen.

• A 1972 top ten hit in the US and UK described by Wikipedia as “the first primarily electronic-based piece of music to reach the American popular music charts” was titled “Popcorn”. You can hear it on YouTube while watching some forgettable visuals. The “Hot Butter” version, although not the original, has some proto-disco strings and is a classic among gimmicky instrumentals.

If you’ve heard “Nude” and remember “Popcorn”, you’ll should enjoy Peter’s More Popcorn, Less Superhet Receiver. If so, please vote for it. Jonny Greenwood seems to smile even less than Thom Yorke, but this should help.

3 Comments

By Timothy Horrigan on April 5, 2008 12:50 AM

I voted for Peter’s remix. His remix was a vast improvement over the typical Radiohead fare.

It’s kind of a chintzy contest… you have pay $4.95 to download the tracks and there seems to be no prize for winning other than the honor of winning. But I think I will take a stab at it myself anyway.

By The Wombat on April 10, 2008 1:01 PM

I like it (and voted). This is also one of my favs:

http://radioheadremix.com/remix/?id=938

The Wombat

By Scott on April 11, 2008 1:52 AM

I voted as well.
This is my current fave too.