So, the new Radiohead album eh? I completely love it, and it only improves with each listen. I’m still a little startled (but becoming less so) at how direct the sound of this album is – to a point that I don’t think Radiohead have been before. But this isn’t a review, so I’ll stop there.

Anyway, the reason for this post is an idle moment on the At Ease message board, around a thread that concerned the kids yelling “YAYY!” on the In Rainbows opener, 15 Step. For those that don’t know, these kids were recorded at the Matrix Music School, which they wrote about on their web site. Looking at the photos, you can tell they’re attempting to get the kids to clap, but no real clapping (that I can hear) is on the track.

I idly speculated as to how such a random sample might have found its way into the track by way of this mock-story:

Colin: “I know! Let’s get authentic handclaps recorded by a classroom of children!”
Band: “Cool!”
Nigel: “OK Colin, let’s go”
(later that day)
Colin: (mutters under breath) “Nige mate, this is a disaster. These kids can’t clap for nuts!”
Nigel: “What the bloody hell are we going to do? These kids think they’re going to be on the next Radiohead album”
Colin: “Uhhh… let’s just tell them it’s not going to happen”
(this is done, with predictable anguish expressed by classroom)
Nigel: “Good thing I was still recording! THAT was worth it!”
Colin: “Do we tell them they might make it after all?”
Nigel: “Nahhhhhh…”

Now, obviously I entirely made this up. I was just wondering how they managed to come up with the idea for something like that.

It seems I wasn’t too far off however, as Nigel Bloomin’ Godrich himself (no kidding! black swan, for those in the know!) responded with the following two words:

almost true..

Now – waitaminute… this wasn’t orginally intended? Were the band initially at the school to record handclaps, but couldn’t for some reason? Was this some kind of way to make good of their time spent recording the kids?