“Insane sort of innocence”: Thom Yorke on the improvisational genius of Björk
Thom Yorke is further proof that great musicianship doesn’t always align with conventional talent.
For years, we were fed this cultural idea that musical excellence exists only in vocal perfection. The pop age of the millennium tried to eradicate nuance from artistic performance and turn the commercial world of music into a giant karaoke contest, with cookie-cutter compositions being led by supposedly flawless voices.
But history has always proven that magic exists somewhere in the flaws. Yorke is like a string of musical icons whose vocal brilliance is rooted in its rough and emotive idiosyncrasies. Like Neil Young or John Lennon, who were less concerned with perfectly hitting the note and more bothered with conveying the emotion, Yorke has always followed his voice into a transcendental space, no matter how rough and ragged it may sound.
While that may sound somewhat reductive, given how good a voice he does indeed have, it’s easier to understand through the lens of certain songs. ‘Everything In Its Right Place’ and ‘Dollars And Cents‘ are two primary examples of my point. Songs that see Yorke lose himself in the atmosphere of the band’s music and almost improvise emotionally over the top, in a way that can’t be taught on the production lines of bubblegum pop.
While Yorke was in a league of his own most of the time, there was one artist he wasn’t afraid to reference as something of a creative influence. Someone who, like Yorke, played outside the lines set by the establishment and instead followed their own instincts to create unique vocal takes that transcend music.
“She was born with a voice that was very sexual, but at the same time very childlike, very vicious and like powerful but no sense that she’d ever do damage,” Yorke once explained of Björk, the Icelandic singer, songwriter whose music eluded any genre description.
Like Yorke and Radiohead, she was hellbent on experimentation with electronica and saw a world where it could evolve into sounds beyond conventional rock. So naturally, Yorke had a deep-rooted sense of admiration for her work.
He continued, “The sound’s totally out of control with her voice, but it’s not at all. You know, there’s a sense in the voice of a tiny kid who’s very, very childlike but very brutal. It’s this insane sort of innocence. The singing she does when the words aren’t really sort of forming is just the best way to improvise. And a lot of times you can’t tell the difference between whether the words are coherent or whether they’re Icelandic or whether it’s gibberish. For a singer, it’s really frustrating sometimes to have a bunch of words in front of you.”
The appreciation Yorke felt towards Björk was reciprocated, with the Icelandic musician at one point claiming that he was, in fact, too good for his remaining bandmates. But hot takes aside, the creative kinship these two shared is clear with the influences of their respective styles being heard across their whole discography, making them, individually and together, two of the most important musicians of the modern era.
