Radiohead's Thom Yorke dropped hints that he'd be a surprise guest at this years Latitude Festival, but the singer had more new solo material up his sleeve than fans expected. For his first concert of 2015, Yorke joined Portishead on stage during Saturday's set to join in on the band's 2008 Third hit, "The Rip."
The track is a personal favorite of the 46-year-old alternative rock singer and was previously executed by Radiohead during soundchecks in 2008. Yorke and Radiohead guitarist, Jonny Greenwood, eventually revealed their acoustic version of "The Rip" on Dead Air Space. "It's dark as man. Definitely their best record, there's no doubt about that," Yorke said of Third in 2008, trailing its release. "My favorite one is a song called 'The Rip' and then there's one at the end which sounds exactly like that old Seventies band Silver Apples - just mental." Drummer Phil Selway of Radiohead and drummer Geoff Barrow of Portishead are known to play alongside one another on a soccer team for charity.
Aside from the joint Yorke-Portishead performance, Yorke continued on to headline his own set, which saw the live debut of two tracks off of his 2014 solo LP, Tomorrow's Modern Boxes. His first solo gig in almost five years was ridden with technical difficulties but he trudged on to play "Truth Ray," "Guess Again!" and "A Brain in a Bottle," alongside his Atoms for Peace project's "Amok" and The Eraser's "Black Swan" and "Harrowdown Hill," notes Rolling Stone.
"Let the machines speak to you," he said according to NME, but the machines broke time and time again, forcing Yorke to perform with an acoustic guitar and bass.
Video clips of the latest tracks have yet to be unearthed, but Yorke reeled in a whopping 3,000 festivalgoers for his set on the tinier iArena stage. It remains a mystery if the unreleased tracks are involved with his solo run or Radiohead's latest studio album and follow up to 2011's The King of Limbs. A video of a college-aged Thom Yorke performing "High and Dry" recently circulated the Internet -- the singer will continue on to perform at Pathway to Paris alongside Patti Smith and Flea of the Red Hot Chili Peppers.
