'An Airbag Saved My Life' was a headline that Thom read in an AA ('Automobile Association', British car roadside recovery company) magazine that came through his door. But the title is also a tongue-in-cheek tribute to Indeep's 1983 disco hit 'Last Night a DJ Saved My Life'.
According to Thom, the song itself is about the feeling you get when you realise that you've just missed having a serious accident, and the feeling of elation that follows. It was inspired by Thom's feeling towards cars (Stupid Car, Killer Cars...) after being involved in a car crash with his girlfriend when he was younger.
According to Thom, the song itself is about the feeling you get when you realise that you've just missed having a serious accident, and the feeling of elation that follows. It was inspired by Thom's feeling towards cars (Stupid Car, Killer Cars...) after being involved in a car crash with his girlfriend when he was younger.
Thom and Jonny premiered the song, that was then titled 'An Airbag Saved My Life', on British radio station XFM on october 28th 1995:
Thom's acoustic demo of the song, which is already slightly more developed in terms of structure and lyrics than the XFM version above, was released in 2017 on the cassette that was part of the OKNOTOK 20th anniversary release of OK Computer:
The earliest available full band performance comes from a soundcheck on April 3rd 1996, courtesy of 'MiniDiscs [HACKED]'. The lyrics are almost the same as the final version, with the final line of the first verse being "an airbag saved my life".
Another early performance comes from May 26th 1996 at the Bataclan in Paris. This still has the "angel at my door" variation in the first verse that was in the demo, but not yet in the XFM version:
The band was apparently inspired by DJ Shadow to use cut-up drum beats for the studio version. A session track called 'Airbag drums through Moog', was released in 2017 on the cassette that was part of the OKNOTOK 20th anniversary release of OK Computer:
This page, titled 'stuck in a frozen lake', appeared on radiohead.com during the recording of OK Computer and features a text by Thom with notes about songs that were around then.
The relevant section was not highlighted in red letters in the original page:
The relevant section was not highlighted in red letters in the original page:

(information incomplete)
....>>>>i like the idea of you listening to our recordings with your head resting gently in emptiness. or before going out. or when you've come back. i dont like the scientists breaking down its molecular structure and teaching it in O level chemistry i ont want to have expain it but it worries me stupid. there is a lot of crying goes into making things.<<<<.... the masters tell us that there is an aspect of our minds that is its fundamental basis, a state called "the ground of the ordinary mind." It functions like a storehouse, in which the imprints of past actions caused by our negative emotions are all store like seeds. when the right conditions arise, they germinate and manifest as circumstances and situations in our lives. if we have a habit of thinking in a particular pattern, positive or negative, then these tendencies will be triggered and provoked very easily and recurr and go on recurring. With constant repetition our inclinations and habits become steadily more entr ched and continue, increasing and gathering power even when we sleep. This is how they come to determine our life, our death our rebirth.