The Universal Sigh

In discussing the forthcoming special "newspaper" edition of the recent Radiohead album King of Limbs, longtime visual collaborator Stanley Donwood mentioned that, "[w]hat I like about newspaper is its ephemeral nature, I like the way the paper goes yellow and brittle when you leave it out in the sunlight. I wanted to do this thing like a really annoying Sunday paper, you know when you buy the paper and all this crap falls out? I wanted to do something really annoying with all these crappy bits of floppy, glossy paper." Evidently, the aesthetic was inspired by a sense of the band's music "not coming to a halt - it was almost like this was kind of a report on its current status."

In keeping with the motif, Radiohead produced a limited run of "newspapers" distributed free around the world to promote the physical release of the new album last Tuesday. Because of the limited number of locations at which the paper was distributed, it soon leaked online through a variety of out-of-the-way sources. Overall, it contains what fans would expect: stray lyrics and song titles, rambling passages echoing Thom Yorke's everpresent "Fitter Happier" outlook on life, and some cool artwork (including one woodcut-like forest scene that resembles a better-rendered cousin of the tracing paper cover to "These Are My Twisted Words"). It also contains short stories by British authors Jay Griffiths and Robert Macfarlane, and interestingly, by Donwood, who previously had usually kept his contributions strictly visual. Interested parties can download the PDF here.