Freak monkeys with mediocre tunes.. New band concept.

Mar 12, 2012:

@nigelgod: Highlight of the tour so far… Being picketed by westboro baptist church this evening.. Hoorah! yfrog.com/nts5nrfj

@nigelgod: Freak monkeys with mediocre tunes.. New band concept. http://yfrog.com/es2pnaoj

While yes the focus of this blog is on the tweets of Chieftan Mew’s we couldn’t let these two tweets from Nigel Godrich go by, in one of the stranger stories to come out of Radiohead’s current tour the show in Kansas City makes the very first by the band to receive a picketing by the Westboro Baptist Church a organisation lead by Fred Phelps that calls Topeka, Kansas home and is infamous for picketing funerals of former military servicemen, schools and other events with homophobic hate messages.

Nigel links the following photo of the protest with his first tweet:

In 2009 the group where blocked from visiting the UK on grounds of inciting hatred. This is probably the reason for the anti-UK placards.

In recent years it seems the church have set their sights on picketing concerts, Last year The Foo Fighters where picketed at the same venue and took to performing a impromptu set on the back of a truck in response.

While in the WBC defense The Foo Fighters had recently released a song titled ‘Hot Buns’ featuring a video of the band as naked homosexual hillbilly’s their reasons for picketing Radiohead is a little.. ‘odd’ comparing Radiohead to a circus monkey and calls them “Freak monkey’s with mediocre tunes.” no.. seriously..

Nigel links the following screenshot taken from the WBC website to his 2nd tweet to prove it:

Interestingly they accuse the band of being ‘focused on lightness’ which puts them rather at odds with the overall view in the press of Radiohead being a overly ‘serious’ band. Maybe they took offense to the Lotus Flower videoclip or mistook the title of Creep as ‘Freak’? Either way fans have pointed to the protest as proof that the band have ‘made it’ in America.

RT: @nigelgod: please god – let the weather get better for glastonbury

Jun 18, 2011:

RT: @nigelgod: please god – let the weather get better for glastonbury @LeoJThompson

Mews retweeted this tweet from Nigel Godrich regarding hopes for better weather for the 2011 Glastonbury festival held on Wednesday the 22nd to Sunday the 26th of June 2011. Radiohead performed a “surprise” set at the festival performing on the Park Stage, their first live performance since the release of The King of Limbs and the first performance of The Daily Mail with the full band. During the show Thom admitted they they where only playing for free tickets to the festival.

Sadly Nigel’s prayers where not answered as The Guardian describes the weather during the set to be ‘pissing down’ in a review of the show.

The day before the Glastonbury was due to start Mews took to Facebook posting a video from Youtube along with a festive message on what would have been the 21st in the UK:

22 June 2011 at 06:40

Chieftan Mews
Don’t mess with the paranormal. These rocks built the druids, not the other way around. Enjoy your summer solstice. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhkGATrm6zY

Stonehenge summer solstice 2011
Filmed at The Summer Solstice festival at English Heritage site Stonehenge. A man tries to climb the rocks and falls into the crowd.

Interestingly Mews must have found that video not that long after it was uploaded as the 2011 Summer Solstice festival falls on the 21st of June, the same day he posted it to Facebook.

The Guardian carried a report about the festival with a photo of another man climbing the rocks they give the following information about the event:

The summer solstice is meant to be a night and dawn of peace, love and amazement. But not all of those attending the celebrations at Stonehenge entered into the spirit of the event.

Druids, pagans and revellers watched as two men, one shirtless, staged a fist fight at the ancient monument in Wiltshire.

While the majority of the 18,000 people who attended the solstice celebrations were well-behaved, 20 arrests and almost 50 drug seizures were made.

Photographer David Hedges, who witnessed the fight, said: “They were sparring for a few minutes before they really started throwing punches.”

Spectators surrounded the pair and a couple tried to break it up before the police arrived.

The 20 arrests included 11 for drugs offences and five for public order offences. Superintendent Gavin Williams of Wiltshire police said most of the attendees “came to see the sunrise in the spirit of the event. Although it was disappointing that some individuals chose to bring drugs with them, they were dealt with robustly.”

(Source: Summer Solstice Celebrated at Stonehenge )

Amazingly it seems nobody got in trouble for climbing the rocks though Karma( or the paranormal) it seemed managed to get one of them. But it’s certainly not like any other historical site of cultural significance is routinely climbed on by visitors against the wishes of locals.. oops!.

Five hours after posting the video Mew’s added a comment to the post after two fans started having a argument in the comements. He provided a link to the videoclip for ‘Why Can’t We Be Friends’ by War from the album by the same name, and added the following message:

22 June 2011 at 12:03

Mews is trying to sleep. Why do you two have to wake him up? Take a dose: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5FfJ89rGPc

You can listen to Why Can’t We Be Friends? Here

Wiki shares the following tidbits on the song:

Recorded in 1974 and released on United Artists Records in June 1975. The title song reached #8 on Billboard’s Hot 100. The original LP edition came with a poster. Two singles from the album were released: “Why Can’t We Be Friends?” backed with “In Mazatlan”, and “Low Rider” backed with “So”. Both A-sides were nominated for the Grammy Awards of 1976.

The song had been used in a wide range of films and television including Dazed and Confused, BASEketball, Lethal Weapon 4 and a 1996 episode of The Simpsons.

Compulsive Liar.

@ChieftanMews: Remember: 99 percent of everything on the internet is a lie.

Mew’s often calls himself a liar, this comes back to his first days as the host of The Most Gigantic Lying Mouth of All Time in 2003.

This gives the impression that everything Mews says can not be trusted.

However the dilemma comes from the fact that while Mews IS most certainly a compulsive liar he is also a unofficial spokesperson for Radiohead within the fan community.