Back in May of 2021, Radiohead’s Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood unveiled their new project ‘The Smile‘, for the first time. The trio made their debut via the Glastonbury livestream, which was held in place of the actual festival. The trio was completed by Tom Skinner, drummer from the London jazz ensemble Sons of Kemet.
This past weekend, the band performed in front of an actual live audience for the first time. The band put on three gigs in the period of 15 hours to allow for people to livestream the concerts in three different time zones.
Thom Yorke is a mean bass player! Yorke and Greenwood alternated between bass and guitar in this trio configuration, but their approaches to the four-stringed instrument are vastly different.
Greenwood attacked his blonde P-Bass with strong pick strokes and plenty of movement at the upper end of the fretboard, much like he did his on his Telecaster thought the gig.
On the other hand, Thom Yorke played some mean bass lines as well. He treated his Fender Mustang like a committed low-end virtuoso, whether navigating The Smoke’s sinuous bass lines or providing some slinky, smooth low ends with a deft finger style touch, he sounded just like a real pro bass player. He probably picked up a few pointers from his experience hanging out with Flea in Atoms for Peace, as well as Jonny’s brother Colin.
Greenwood, several times during the concert, went full on Geddy Lee mode on, pounding bass pedals while managing tricky arpeggiated chords or banging out a scorching punk bass lines.
It’s the sound of three seasoned multi-instrumentalist musicians playing music for the sheer joy of it. It’s a joy to watch and listen to them. The band seems to agree, since they’ve already hinted at music beyond their debut album, which has yet to be given a release date.
