The inception of 'Kid A' lies in a bit of music Thom programmed on a sequencer ("the 505"). That sequence was already called 'Kid A' when the song began to take shape. Thom formed the lyrics by pulling lines from cut up writings out of a top hat, and to him they must have been related to incredibly violent imagery, as he refused to sing them straight - at least during the making of the record, in subsequent live performances he would. For the album version he recited the words rhythmically over the backing track while Jonny manipulated the pitch of his voice using the ondes Martenot, which was connected to a vocoder. Thus Jonny wrote the melody, and Thom felt largely irresponsible for the track, the content of which he considered to be so devastating. It is Thom who plays bass on the album version.
Two entries from Ed's Diary are related to the song. The first indicates that 'Kid A' was finished relatively early in the sessions, being mixed in late november 1999 already. So it doesn't come as a surprise that the track doesn't appear on the list of songs that the band was working on in early march 2000:
Two entries from Ed's Diary are related to the song. The first indicates that 'Kid A' was finished relatively early in the sessions, being mixed in late november 1999 already. So it doesn't come as a surprise that the track doesn't appear on the list of songs that the band was working on in early march 2000:
Undated (mid-november 1999), posted on december 1st 1999
-i've tried to write something about what we've been doing in the last five weeks - there have been the day-by-day accounts which have been of the 'we did this and then we did that' variety..........all incredibly boring to read. then there have been a couple of 'essays' written whilst stoned late at night, only to be re-read the next morning. pretensious old tosh. all have been discarded. it's easy to get extremely self-conscious doing this. we're in london at present and nigel is mixing; he has been for three days. which means that we have actually finished six or so tracks. this has been our life for the last five weeks - we had a list of about ten songs which was then further narrowed down to six. they are definitely different....................there's an eight piece brass ensemble in a charles mingus style on one - eight 'jazzers' came down for the day and blew their stuff all over 'everyone - the national anthem'. they were fantastic............thom and jonny conducted. what a day. there's 'optimistic', there's another which started off as a thom doodle on the 505........there's also the paris version of 'lost at sea'.........the batsford 'morning bell'.it is different. but that's what we do. what has also become evident is that the summer panic that led to two months rehearsal may have been a little premature.....or at the very least a little on the hysterical side.there was some good stuff recorded in paris, copenhagen and batsford. i've been listening to alot of the copenhagen tracks and out-takes and the overall sound is great. pretty dark but then that session was hardly a chuckle-trousered affair.
-i've tried to write something about what we've been doing in the last five weeks - there have been the day-by-day accounts which have been of the 'we did this and then we did that' variety..........all incredibly boring to read. then there have been a couple of 'essays' written whilst stoned late at night, only to be re-read the next morning. pretensious old tosh. all have been discarded. it's easy to get extremely self-conscious doing this. we're in london at present and nigel is mixing; he has been for three days. which means that we have actually finished six or so tracks. this has been our life for the last five weeks - we had a list of about ten songs which was then further narrowed down to six. they are definitely different....................there's an eight piece brass ensemble in a charles mingus style on one - eight 'jazzers' came down for the day and blew their stuff all over 'everyone - the national anthem'. they were fantastic............thom and jonny conducted. what a day. there's 'optimistic', there's another which started off as a thom doodle on the 505........there's also the paris version of 'lost at sea'.........the batsford 'morning bell'.it is different. but that's what we do. what has also become evident is that the summer panic that led to two months rehearsal may have been a little premature.....or at the very least a little on the hysterical side.there was some good stuff recorded in paris, copenhagen and batsford. i've been listening to alot of the copenhagen tracks and out-takes and the overall sound is great. pretty dark but then that session was hardly a chuckle-trousered affair.
tuesday, november 23rd 1999, posted on december 1st 1999
not such a great start to the week. of those six songs that nigel mixed only one is right - kid a. but nigel is pretty optimistic about the others, he knows what he wants to do with them. so we draw up another list of songs to be worked on in the next three weeks.next a meeting with chris, bryce and brian (the management). they've left us alone up until now, realising that we needed time - time basically to sort our shit out. i think their aim was to refamiliarise us with the workings of the this industry that we operate in. for instance nowadays if we want to tour, about five months notice is required, for booking the venues, notifying our crew, etc. it seems like a long time for just some gigs. part of the problem is we've really given it no thought at all - and suddenly you're presented with these facts of life. we want to do gigs,but we have to make this record - and then we don't even know whether they'll work as a live entity. sometimes it seems like it's so fucking complicated.
not such a great start to the week. of those six songs that nigel mixed only one is right - kid a. but nigel is pretty optimistic about the others, he knows what he wants to do with them. so we draw up another list of songs to be worked on in the next three weeks.next a meeting with chris, bryce and brian (the management). they've left us alone up until now, realising that we needed time - time basically to sort our shit out. i think their aim was to refamiliarise us with the workings of the this industry that we operate in. for instance nowadays if we want to tour, about five months notice is required, for booking the venues, notifying our crew, etc. it seems like a long time for just some gigs. part of the problem is we've really given it no thought at all - and suddenly you're presented with these facts of life. we want to do gigs,but we have to make this record - and then we don't even know whether they'll work as a live entity. sometimes it seems like it's so fucking complicated.
