Radiohead discussed why the beloved single Lift never made it onto their classic album OK Computer for BBC 6 Music.
Lift will finally to be released on the 20th anniversary reissue of the album, along with two more tracks: I Promise and Man Of War. The guitar player Ed O’Brien told that the track “would have killed them” if it was released earlier:
“Lift is a funny song. We played that live with Alanis Morrissette, and it was a really interesting song because the audience, suddenly you’d see them get up and start grooving, it had this kind of infectiousness about it. It was a big, anthemic song. If that song had been on that album, it would have taken us to a different place, and we’d have probably sold a lot more records, if we’d done it right, and everyone was saying this.”
York continued:
“I think we kind of subconsciously killed it, because if OK Computer had been like a Jagged Little Pill, like Alanis Morrissette, it would have killed us. But Lift probably had the potential, if we’d done it right, it just had this magic about it. And we didn’t do a good version, because when we got to the studio and did it on that record it was a bit like having a gun to your head, it felt like so much pressure.”
