The Smile are an English rock band comprising the Radiohead members Thom Yorke (vocals, guitar, bass, keys) and Jonny Greenwood (guitar, bass, keys) with the drummer Tom Skinner. They are produced by Nigel Godrich, Radiohead's longtime producer. They incorporate elements of post-punk, progressive rock, Afrobeat and electronic music.

The Smile
The Smile in January 2022. From left: Jonny Greenwood, Tom Skinner, Thom Yorke
Background information
Genres	Alternative rock art rock post-punk
Years active	2020–present
Labels	XL Recordings Self Help Tapes
Spinoff of	Radiohead
Members	Thom Yorke Jonny Greenwood Tom Skinner
Website	thesmiletheband.com

The Smile worked during the COVID-19 lockdowns and made their surprise debut in a performance streamed by Glastonbury Festival in May 2021. In early 2022, they released six singles and performed to an audience for the first time at three shows in London in January, which were livestreamed. In May, the Smile released their debut album, A Light for Attracting Attention, to acclaim, and began an international tour.

History

Jonny Greenwood said the Smile came from his desire to work with his Radiohead bandmate Thom Yorke during the COVID-19 lockdown.[1] The Smile are produced by Nigel Godrich, Radiohead's longtime producer.[2] Godrich said the project emerged from Greenwood "writing all these riffs, waiting for something to happen". He cited the pandemic and the unavailability of the Radiohead guitarist Ed O'Brien, who was busy with his debut solo album, Earth, as motivating factors.[3] Greenwood said: "We didn't have much time, but we just wanted to finish some songs together. It's been very stop-start, but it's felt a happy way to make music."[4]

Greenwood and Yorke enlisted the drummer Tom Skinner, who had played with acts including the jazz band Sons of Kemet.[1] Skinner first worked with Greenwood when he played on Greenwood’s soundtrack to the 2012 film The Master.[5] The Smile members agreed not to give interviews about the project.[5]

The Smile take their name from the title of a poem by Ted Hughes.[6] Yorke said it was "not the smile as in 'ahh', more the smile as in the guy who lies to you every day".[7] The Smile made their debut in a surprise performance for the concert video Live at Worthy Farm, produced by Glastonbury Festival and streamed on May 22, 2021. The performance was recorded in secret earlier that week and announced on the day of the stream.[6] The band performed eight songs, with Yorke and Greenwood on guitar, bass, Moog synthesiser and Rhodes piano.[8]

First public performances

Yorke performed a Smile song, "Free in the Knowledge", at the Letters Live event at the Royal Albert Hall, London, in October 2021.[9] On January 29 and 30, 2022, the Smile performed to an audience for the first time at three shows at Magazine, London, which were livestreamed.[10] They played in the round, and debuted several tracks, including "Speech Bubbles", "A Hairdryer", "Waving a White Flag" and "The Same".[11] The shows also included performances of "Open the Floodgates",[10] which Yorke first performed in 2010,[12] and a cover of the 1979 Joe Jackson single "It's Different for Girls".[11]

In NME, James Balmont gave the Smile's London show four out five, describing it as "meticulous, captivating stuff".[13] In the Guardian, Kitty Empire gave it four out of five, writing that "the Smile are most musically convincing when they stretch farther away from Radiohead",[14] while chief critic Alexis Petridis gave it three, saying it was "intriguing rather than dazzling, intermittently spellbinding, filled with fascinating ideas that don't always coalesce".[15]

A Light for Attracting Attention

On 20 April 2022, the Smile announced their debut album, A Light for Attracting Attention. It was released digitally through XL Recordings on 13 May 2022, with a physical release set for 17 June.[16] A Light for Attracting Attention received acclaim;[17] the Pitchfork critic Ryan Dombal wrote that it was "instantly, unmistakably the best album yet by a Radiohead side project".[18] It reached number five on the UK Albums Chart.[19]

The first single, "You Will Never Work in Television Again", was released on streaming platforms on 5 January 2022.[20] It was followed by "The Smoke",[21] "Skrting on the Surface",[22] "Pana-vision",[23] "Free In The Knowledge",[24] and "Thin Thing".[25] On 16 May, the Smile began a European tour,[26] with a North American tour to follow in November.[27] The tour included performances of the Light for Attracting Attention outtake "Just Eyes and Mouth", Yorke's 2009 single "FeelingPulledApartByHorses", and newly written material.[28][29]

Style

Consequence wrote that the Smile incorporate elements of post-punk, proto-punk and math rock.[30] Pitchfork likened them to Radiohead's "vintage rock sensibilities", with a "slight bounce to Skinner's drums" and "unfamiliar aggression from Greenwood in the bassline".[8] The Guardian critic Alexis Petridis said the Smile "sound like a simultaneously more skeletal and knottier version of Radiohead", exploring progressive rock influences with unusual time signatures, complex riffs and "hard-driving" motorik psychedelia.[31] Kitty Empire noted Afrobeat elements in "Just Eyes and Mouth" and influence from 1960s electronic music and systems music in "Open the Floodgates" and "The Same".[14] Reviewing "You Will Never Work in Television Again", the Pitchfork critic Jayson Greene described it as a "raw-boned rock number" reminiscent of Radiohead's 1995 album The Bends.[32]

Members

• Jonny Greenwood – guitar, bass, keyboards, piano, harp
• Tom Skinner – drums, percussion, keyboards, backing vocals
• Thom Yorke – vocals, bass, guitar, keyboards, piano

Discography

Studio album

Singles

References

На других языках

[es] The Smile (banda)

[it] The Smile

[ru] The Smile (группа)