A biography for Thom Yorkehasn’t been written yet.
“This was something that was obsessing me and creating a writer's block. To get involved and get stuck in, get the proper information about what's going on has really helped.”
“I had a series of mini-breakdowns where the public persona - this thing, this face, this person who writes this music... I would walk past that person in the mirror or listen to that person playing guitar and I didn't know who they were.”
“I think we're entering a very dangerous time. The West has set itself up, decided it's in charge, not for good intentions, not for the benefit of mankind.”
“My argument would be that I don't think there is much that's genuinely political art that is good art.”
“I grew up believing that I was fundamentally powerless.”
“Sometimes the nicest thing to do with a guitar is just look at it.”
“People in bands don't have the kind of conversations people might think they have. The best things about being in a band are the things that are unsaid.”
“My songs are my kids. Some of them stay with me, some others I have to send out, out to the war. It might sound stupid and it might even sound naive, but that's just the way it is.”
“I think the most important thing about music is the sense of escape.”
“Generally speaking, if people are prepared to stick their heads above the power pit, like Zinn says, and absorb what's going on around them, it makes them think.”
“I went to a boys' school, and I didn't realize that most guys join bands because they wanted to get girls. I was not really focused on that the way everybody else was.”
“We don't have to stand on a soap-box and preach because hopefully we're channelling it through the new record.”
“You think I have the responsibilty... I have the responsibility to give the fans a good time!”
“I think maybe since there isn't a great deal of access to the mainstream media and people don't understand the language of mainstream media, if you put music out there with lyrics that are loosely political, people absorb some of it and spit it back out.”
“If we got into a situation where people start burning our records, then bring it on. That's the whole point. The gloaming has begun. We're in the darkness. This has happened before. Go read some history.”
“I'm not afraid of computers taking over the world.”
“I don't see it in terms of changing things, but rather using language and music as weapons for fighting a mainstream media which is predominately right wing, and loyal to the political framework and its corporate interests.”
“Someone needs to tell the truth, but it shouldn't be my job.”
“I grew up under Thatcher. I grew up believing that I was fundamentally powerless. Then gradually over the years it occurred to me that this was actually a very convenient myth for the state.”
“I think a lot of tunes can suffer from being so simple, so either they get over-complicated or their simplicity means the simple way to lay them down becomes the difficulty.”