The 2007 Radiohead song born out of a “mad rhythm experiment”
Across more than 30 years, Radiohead have shown a deliberate need to keep things strange.
As their career has progressed, the British alt-rockers have evolved into an increasingly experimental group, one that loves to use unusual instrumentation and unique compositional techniques. As a result, Radiohead’s music has become far more complex than the standard rock song.
A great example is the 2007 track ’15 Step’. The lead track from the group’s In Rainbows album, ’15 Step’, completely disregards the typical idea of easing audiences into an album. Instead, Radiohead throw listeners into the deep end immediately with a mind-bending 5/4 time signature. Propelled by drum machines and drum kits playing off, but not necessarily with, each other, ’15 Step’ was pure experimentation that fell into a classic Radiohead track.
Part of what makes Radiohead’s experimentation so effective is that the band rarely treats complexity as an end in itself. Odd time signatures, unconventional song structures and electronic textures are woven into the emotional atmosphere of the music rather than presented as technical exercises. Even when tracks like ‘15 Step’ feel rhythmically disorientating, there remains a sense of groove and momentum that keeps the song accessible beneath its intricacy.
That balance became especially important during the In Rainbows era, when Radiohead were searching for ways to reconnect warmth and immediacy with the more abstract ideas they had explored on Kid A and Amnesiac. Songs like ‘15 Step’ and ‘Weird Fishes/Arpeggi’ still pushed the boundaries of modern rock composition, but they also possessed a looseness and humanity that made the album feel more inviting than some of the band’s earlier experimental work.
According to Thom Yorke, the song was born from different attempts at nailing down the titular rhythm. Although ’15 Step’ eventually found its right form through different twists and turns in the studio, a slightly disturbing thought eventually presented itself: how was the band going to replicate this song live? The answer came from another experimental track from Canadian electronic musician Peaches.
“There’s a track called ’15 Steps’ which was born out of a mad rhythm experiment that we did last year,” Yorke told Mojo Magazine in 2006. “At first we thought, ‘How the fuck can we pull this off live?’ But then we were listening to ‘Fuck The Pain Away’ by Peaches a lot, and that indirectly inspired us to turn it into something different. It’s got a bass line like ‘Airbag’, and it’s in 5/4 time with this ‘clapping’ groove throughout. I really like the lyrics. ‘You used to be alright / What happened? / Et cetera et cetera / Friends forever!’ 15 steps – then a sheer drop.'”
It’s not the only Radiohead song with a tricky time signature. ‘Morning Bell’ from 2001’s Amnesiac was composed in a 7/8 time signature that skipped and skittered in a similarly wonky style. During concerts, Radiohead have been known to play the two songs back-to-back to throw audiences off their rhythm. When Ed O’Brien discussed the band’s concerts at Madison Square Garden in 2006, he mentioned why the two songs were paired together.
“Putting ’15 Step’ and ‘Morning Bell’ together was deliberate,” O’Brien told New York Magazine. “’15 Step’ is in 5/4 and ‘Morning Bell’ is in 7/8. It’s nice to have a bit of clapping, a bit of audience participation, if they can get the beat. In Spain, they love ‘Morning Bell’ – all the fast clapping is like flamenco music. But in the West, we’re not very rhythm-savvy. Anything not in 4/4 is hard for a lot of people.”
Check out the live version of ’15 Step’ from the BBC programme From The Basement down below.
