Ed O’Brien Compares Radiohead’s “Paranoid Android” & Pretty Things’ “In The Square” On ‘Broken Record’ Podcast

Source Domain: stereogum.com

Ed O’Brien has been making the rounds to promote his new solo album Blue Morpho, including a lovely We’ve Got A File On You interview with me here at Stereogum. The latest stop on his promo tour is the Broken Record podcast, where host Justin Richmond surprised him with a listen to a “Paranoid Android” soundalike from 27 years prior.

More than an hour into the episode, Richmond asks if O’Brien has ever heard “In The Square” from London rock band the Pretty Things’ 1970 album Parachute. Richmond notes that it has always reminded him of “Paranoid Android.” A curious, tentative O’Brien replies, “Do people think it’s some kind of lift?” (No, not “Lift,” Ed.)

They then proceed to listen. When the peaceful major-key section shifts to dissonant guitar arpeggios, O’Brien’s eyes go wide at the resemblance to the OK Computer prog epic. Although he notes that Radiohead descend to E major while the Pretty Things opt for E minor, he is otherwise speechless at the resemblance. Check it out below, starting at the 1h2m35s mark.

Elsewhere in the episode, O’Brien recalls attending Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg’s Coachella performance with the 2Pac hologram in 2012, when Radiohead also headlined the fest. “I had some of those chocolate mushrooms I stayed on,” O’Brien recalls. “I remember watching that show, and that bass, and the sound, and I was just like, ‘Man, shit. This makes us look like a fucking string quartet. And I think we’ve always longed to have a bit of that West Coast or whatever, that depth, that bass. And I think we — not that we’re there — but it’s a work in progress.”

He adds that when Radiohead were working on Kid A, he was obsessed with Dre’s production work, especially on Blackstreet’s “No Diggity.” “I was just like, ‘Fuck, how cool would it be for Radiohead to work with Dr. Dre?’ It was just like a dream, in another world, in a parallel universe.” Watch a clip of that moment below.

O’Brien also comes out in…

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