Editing OK Computer (section)

==Music and lyrics==

===Style and influences===
{{multiple image
| direction         = vertical
| alignment         = center
| perrow            = 2
| total_width       = 220
| image1            = Miles Davis - 1986 (cropped).jpg
| image2            = Noam chomsky cropped.jpg
| footer            = The [[jazz fusion]] of [[Miles Davis]] (top, 1986) and political writings of [[Noam Chomsky]] (bottom, 2005) influenced ''OK Computer''.
}}

Yorke said Radiohead's starting point was the "incredibly dense and terrifying sound" of ''[[Bitches Brew]]'', the 1970 [[avant-garde jazz|avant-garde]] [[jazz fusion]] album by [[Miles Davis]].<ref name="LAUNCH"/> He said: "It was building something up and watching it fall apart, that's the beauty of it. It was at the core of what we were trying to do with ''OK Computer''."<ref name="Sutcliffe1999">{{citation
 | first = Phil
 | last = Sutcliffe
 | title = Radiohead: An Interview with Thom Yorke
 | magazine = [[Q (magazine)|Q]]
 | date = October 1999}}</ref> Yorke identified "I'll Wear It Proudly" by [[Elvis Costello]], "[[Fall on Me (R.E.M. song)|Fall on Me]]" by [[R.E.M.]], "[[Dress (PJ Harvey song)|Dress]]" by [[PJ Harvey]] and "[[A Day in the Life]]" by the [[The Beatles|Beatles]] as particularly influential.<ref name="IRVIN"/> Radiohead drew further inspiration from the [[film soundtrack]] composer [[Ennio Morricone]] and the [[krautrock]] band [[Can (band)|Can]], musicians Yorke described as "abusing the recording process".<ref name="IRVIN"/> Jonny Greenwood described ''OK Computer'' as a product of being "in love with all these brilliant records ... trying to recreate them, and missing".<ref name="MORAN"/>

According to Yorke, Radiohead hoped to achieve an "atmosphere that's perhaps a bit shocking when you first hear it, but only as shocking as the atmosphere on the [[the Beach Boys|Beach Boys]]' ''[[Pet Sounds]]''".<ref name="LAUNCH"/> They extended their instrumentation to include [[electric piano]], [[Mellotron]], and [[glockenspiel]]. Jonny Greenwood summarised the exploratory approach as "when we've got what we suspect to be an amazing song, but nobody knows what they're gonna play on it".<ref name="BAILIE">{{citation
 | first = Stuart
 | last = Bailie
 | title = Viva la Megabytes!
 | date = 21 June 1997
| magazine = [[NME]]}}</ref> ''[[Spin (magazine)|Spin]]'' said ''OK Computer'' sounded like "a DIY [[electronica]] album made with guitars".<ref name="Spin review">
{{citation
 | first = Barry
 | last = Walters
 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=_uWz-QtMkI4C&pg=PA112
 | title = Radiohead: OK Computer (Capitol)
 | date = August 1997
 | access-date = 6 April 2020
| magazine = [[Spin (magazine)|Spin]]
 | volume = 13
 | issue = 5
 | pages = 112–13}}</ref>

Critics suggested a stylistic debt to 1970s [[progressive rock]], an influence that Radiohead have disavowed.<ref name="Sanneh">{{citation
 | first = Kelefa
 | last = Sanneh
 | author-link = Kelefa Sanneh
 | title = The Persistence of Prog Rock
 | url = https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/06/19/the-persistence-of-prog-rock
 | date = 19 June 2017
| magazine = [[The New Yorker]]
 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20170612062331/http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/06/19/the-persistence-of-prog-rock
 | archive-date = 12 June 2017
| url-status = live}}</ref><ref name="progeny" /> According to Andy Greene in ''Rolling Stone'', Radiohead "were collectively hostile to seventies progressive rock ... but that didn't stop them from reinventing prog from scratch on ''OK Computer'', particularly on the six-and-a-half-minute 'Paranoid Android'."<ref name="Rhapsody in Gloom" /> [[Tom Hull (critic)|Tom Hull]] believed the album was "still prog, but may just be because rock has so thoroughly enveloped musical storytelling that this sort of thing has become inevitable."<ref name="Hull"/> Writing in 2017, ''[[The New Yorker]]''{{'}}s [[Kelefa Sanneh]] said ''OK Computer'' "was profoundly prog: grand and dystopian, with a lead single that was more than six minutes long".<ref name="Sanneh" />

===Lyrics===
The album's lyrics, written by Yorke, are more abstract compared to his personal, emotional lyrics for ''The Bends''. Critic [[Alex Ross (music critic)|Alex Ross]] said the lyrics "seemed a mixture of overheard conversations, [[technobabble|techno-speak]], and fragments of a harsh diary" with "images of [[riot control|riot police]] at political rallies, anguished lives in tidy suburbs, [[yuppie]]s freaking out, sympathetic aliens gliding overhead."{{sfn|Ross|2010|p=88}} Recurring themes include transport, technology, insanity, death, modern British life, [[globalisation]] and [[anti-capitalism]].{{sfn|Footman|2007|pp=142–150}} Yorke said: "On this album, the outside world became all there was&nbsp;... I'm just taking [[instant camera|Polaroids]] of things around me moving too fast."<ref>
{{citation
 | first = Mark
 | last = Sutherland
 | title = Rounding the Bends
 | date = 24 May 1997
| magazine = [[Melody Maker]]
}}</ref> He told ''Q'': "It was like there's a secret camera in a room and it's watching the character who walks in—a different character for each song. The camera's not quite me. It's neutral, emotionless. But not emotionless at all. In fact, the very opposite."<ref name="SUTCLIFFE">
{{citation
 | first = Phil
 | last = Sutcliffe
 | title = Death is all around
 | date = 1 October 1997
| magazine = [[Q (magazine)|Q]]}}</ref> Yorke also drew inspiration from books, including [[Noam Chomsky]]'s political writing,<ref name="SAKAMOTO">{{citation
 | last = Sakamoto
 | first = John
 | author-link = John Sakamoto
 | title = Radiohead talk about their new video
 | magazine = [[Jam!]]
 | date = 2 June 1997
}}</ref> [[Eric Hobsbawm]]'s ''[[The Age of Extremes]]'', [[Will Hutton]]'s ''The State We're In'', [[Jonathan Coe]]'s ''[[What a Carve Up! (novel)|What a Carve Up!]]'' and [[Philip K. Dick]]'s ''[[VALIS]]''.<ref name=LYNSKEYq>{{citation
 | first = Dorian
 | last = Lynskey
 | title = Welcome to the Machine
 | date = February 2011
 | magazine = [[Q (magazine)|Q]]|ref=none}}</ref>

The songs of ''OK Computer'' do not have a coherent narrative, and the album's lyrics are generally considered abstract or oblique. Nonetheless, many musical critics, journalists, and scholars consider the album to be a [[concept album]] or [[song cycle]], or have analysed it as a concept album, noting its strong thematic cohesion, aesthetic unity, and the structural logic of the song sequencing.<ref group="nb">Conversely, other critics have also argued that ''OK Computer'' is a concept album only in part, or in a nontraditional or qualified sense, or is ''not'' a concept album at all. See [[#CITEREFLetts2010|Letts 2010]], pp. 28–32</ref> Although the songs share common themes, Radiohead have said they do not consider ''OK Computer'' a concept album and did not intend to link the songs through a narrative or unifying concept while it was being written.<ref name="Request">{{citation
 | first = Sandy
 | last = Masuo
 | title = Subterranean Aliens
 | date = September 1997
 | magazine = Request
}}</ref><ref name="WADSWORTH">{{citation|first=Tony|last=Wadsworth|title=The Making of OK Computer|date=20 December 1997|newspaper=[[The Guardian]]}}</ref>{{sfn|Letts|2010|pp=32}} Jonny Greenwood said: "I think one album title and one computer voice do not make a concept album. That's a bit of a red herring."{{sfn|Clarke|2010|p=124}} However, the band intended the album to be heard as a whole, and spent two weeks ordering the track list. O'Brien said: "The context of each song is really important&nbsp;... It's not a concept album but there is a continuity there."<ref name="WADSWORTH"/>

===Composition===

====Tracks 1–6====
{{Listen
 | filename = Airbag.ogg
 | title = "Airbag"
 | description = "Airbag" features sparse bass and a programmed drum beat influenced by the music of [[DJ Shadow]]. This audio sample contains a portion of the song's first verse.
 | filename2 = Paranoid Android.ogg
 | title2 = "Paranoid Android"
 | description2 = "[[Paranoid Android]]", Radiohead's second-longest song, has a multi-section structure and has been called one of the most ambitious songs of all time. This audio sample is from the middle of the second section to the beginning of the first guitar solo.}}

The opening track, "Airbag", is underpinned by a beat built from a seconds-long recording of Selway's drumming. The band sampled the drum track with a [[sampler (musical instrument)|sampler]] and edited it with a [[Macintosh]] computer, inspired by the music of [[DJ Shadow]], but admitted to making approximations in emulating Shadow's style due to their programming inexperience.<ref name="RANDALL p. 4">{{cite journal
 |first       = Mac
 |last        = Randall
 |title       = Radiohead interview: The Golden Age of Radiohead
 |url         = http://www.guitarworld.com/radiohead_the_golden_age_of_radiohead?page=0,3
 |date        = 1 April 1998
|journal    = [[Guitar World]]
 |archive-url  = https://web.archive.org/web/20121003065151/http://www.guitarworld.com/radiohead_the_golden_age_of_radiohead?page=0,3
 |archive-date = 3 October 2012
|url-status     = dead
}}</ref>{{sfn|Footman|2007|p=42}} The bassline stops and starts unexpectedly, achieving an effect similar to 1970s [[dub music|dub]].{{sfn|Footman|2007|p=43}} The original draft of the lyrics for "Airbag" were written inside a copy of [[William Blake]]'s ''[[Songs of Innocence and of Experience]]'' that Yorke had also annotated with his own notes; this personal copy was later auctioned off by Yorke in 2016 with proceeds going to [[Oxfam]].<ref>{{cite web |first = Parker |last = Hall |title = Thom Yorke to auction original Radiohead lyrics, written inside a William Blake novel |website = [[Digital Trends]] |url = https://www.digitaltrends.com/music/radioheads-thom-yorke-auction-handwritten-lyrics/ |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20220812070249/https://www.digitaltrends.com/music/radioheads-thom-yorke-auction-handwritten-lyrics/ |date = 4 February 2016 |archive-date = 12 August 2022 |url-status = live}}</ref> The song's references to automobile crashes and [[reincarnation]] were inspired by a magazine article titled "An Airbag Saved My Life" and ''[[The Tibetan Book of the Dead]]''. Yorke wrote "Airbag" about the illusion of safety offered by modern transit, and "the idea that whenever you go out on the road you could be killed".<ref name="SUTCLIFFE"/> The BBC wrote about the influence of [[J. G. Ballard]], especially his 1973 novel ''[[Crash (J. G. Ballard novel)|Crash]]'', on the lyrics.<ref>{{cite news|last=Dowling|first=Stephen|title=What pop music tells us about JG Ballard|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/8008277.stm|publisher=BBC|access-date=17 January 2017|date=20 April 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090423052125/http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/8008277.stm|archive-date=23 April 2009|url-status=live}}</ref> Music journalist [[Tim Footman]] noted that the song's technical innovations and lyrical concerns demonstrated the "key paradox" of the album: "The musicians and producer are delighting in the sonic possibilities of modern technology; the singer, meanwhile, is railing against its social, moral, and psychological impact ... It's a contradiction mirrored in the culture clash of the music, with the 'real' guitars negotiating an uneasy stand-off with the hacked-up, processed drums."{{sfn|Footman|2007|p=46}}

Split into four sections with an overall running time of 6:23, "[[Paranoid Android]]" is among the band's longest songs. The unconventional structure was inspired by the Beatles' "[[Happiness Is a Warm Gun]]" and [[Queen (band)|Queen]]'s "[[Bohemian Rhapsody]]", which also eschew a traditional [[Verse–chorus form|verse-chorus-verse]] structure.{{sfn|Randall|2000|pp=214–215}} Its musical style was also inspired by the music of the [[Pixies (band)|Pixies]].<ref name="MM"/> The song was written by Yorke after an unpleasant night at a Los Angeles bar, where he saw a woman react violently after someone spilled a drink on her.<ref name="SUTCLIFFE"/> Its title and lyrics are a reference to [[Marvin the Paranoid Android]] from [[Douglas Adams]]'s ''[[The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]]'' series.<ref name="MM"/>

The use of electric keyboards in "Subterranean Homesick Alien" is an example of the band's attempts to emulate the atmosphere of ''Bitches Brew''.<ref name="MORAN">{{citation
 | first = Caitlin
 | last = Moran
 | author-link = Caitlin Moran
 | title = Everything was just fear
 | magazine = [[Select (magazine)|Select]]
 | page = 87
 | date = July 1997}}</ref>{{sfn|Footman|2007|p=62}} Its title references the [[Bob Dylan]] song "[[Subterranean Homesick Blues]]", and the lyrics describe an isolated narrator who fantasises about being [[abduction phenomenon|abducted]] by [[extraterrestrial life|extraterrestrials]]. The narrator speculates that, upon returning to Earth, his friends would not believe his story and he would remain a misfit.{{sfn|Footman|2007|pp=60–61}} The lyrics were inspired by an assignment from Yorke's time at [[Abingdon School]] to write a piece of "[[Martian poetry]]", a British literary movement that humorously recontextualises mundane aspects of human life from an alien perspective.{{sfn|Footman|2007|pp=59–60}}

[[William Shakespeare]]'s ''[[Romeo and Juliet]]'' inspired the lyrics for "Exit Music (For a Film)".<ref name="MM"/> Initially Yorke wanted to work lines from the play into the song, but the final draft of the lyrics became a broad summary of the narrative.{{sfn|Footman|2007|p=67}} He said: "I saw [[Romeo and Juliet (1968 film)|the Zeffirelli version]] when I was 13 and I cried my eyes out, because I couldn't understand why, the morning after they shagged, they didn't just run away. It's a song for two people who should run away before all the bad stuff starts."<ref name="Moran_92">{{cite journal|first=Caitlin|last=Moran|author-link=Caitlin Moran|title=I was feeling incredible hysteria and panic&nbsp;...|journal=[[Select (magazine)|Select]]|date=July 1997|page=92}}</ref> Yorke compared the opening of the song, which mostly features his singing paired with acoustic guitar, to [[Johnny Cash]]'s ''[[At Folsom Prison]]''.{{sfn|Randall|2000|p=154}} [[Mellotron]] choir and other electronic voices are used throughout the track.{{sfn|Footman|2007|p=66}} The song climaxes with the entrance of drums{{sfn|Footman|2007|p=66}} and distorted bass run through a [[distortion (music)|fuzz pedal]].<ref name="WYLIE">{{citation
 | first = Harry
 | last = Wylie
 | title = Radiohead
 | magazine = [[Total Guitar]]
 | date = November 1997}}</ref> The climactic portion of the song is an attempt to emulate the sound of [[trip hop]] group [[Portishead (band)|Portishead]], but in a style that the bassist, [[Colin Greenwood]], called more "stilted and leaden and mechanical".<ref>{{citation
 | first = Stephen
 | last = Dalton
 | title = The Dour & The Glory
 | magazine = [[Vox (magazine)|Vox]]
 | date = September 1997}}</ref> The song concludes by fading back to Yorke's voice, acoustic guitar and Mellotron.{{sfn|Footman|2007|p=67}}

"[[Let Down (Radiohead song)|Let Down]]" contains multilayered [[arpeggio|arpeggiated]] guitars and electric piano. Jonny Greenwood plays his guitar part in a different [[time signature]] to the other instruments.{{sfn|Footman|2007|p=73}} O'Brien said the song was influenced by [[Phil Spector]], a producer and songwriter best known for his reverberating "[[Wall of Sound]]" recording techniques.<ref name="RANDALL p. 4"/> The lyrics, Yorke said, are about a fear of being trapped,<ref name="Moran_92" /> and "about that feeling that you get when you're in transit but you're not in control of it—you just go past thousands of places and thousands of people and you're completely removed from it".<ref name="MM"/> Of the line "Don't get sentimental / It always ends up drivel", Yorke said: "Sentimentality is being emotional for the sake of it. We're bombarded with sentiment, people emoting. That's the Let Down. Feeling every emotion is fake. Or rather every emotion is on the same plane whether it's a car advert or a pop song."<ref name="Sutcliffe1999" /> Yorke felt that scepticism of emotion was characteristic of [[Generation X]] and that it had informed the band's approach to the album.<ref>{{citation
 | first = Mary
 | last = Gaitskill
 | title = Radiohead: Alarms and Surprises
 | magazine = [[Alternative Press (music magazine)|Alternative Press]]
 | date = April 1998}}</ref>

"[[Karma Police]]" has two main verses that alternate with a subdued break, followed by a different ending section.<ref name="Huey">{{cite web
 | first = Steve
 | last = Huey
 | title = Karma Police
 | website = [[AllMusic]]
 | url = https://www.allmusic.com/song/karma-police-t1416670
 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20101210235903/http://allmusic.com/song/karma-police-t1416670
 | archive-date = 10 December 2010
| url-status = live}}</ref> The verses centre around acoustic guitar and piano,<ref name="Huey"/> with a chord progression indebted to the Beatles' "[[Sexy Sadie]]".<ref name="LOWE">{{citation|last=Lowe|first=Steve|title=Back to Save the Universe|date=December 1999|magazine=[[Select (magazine)|Select]]}}</ref>{{sfn|Footman|2007|p=79}}<ref name="KENT"/> Starting at 2:34, the song transitions into an orchestrated section with the repeated line "For a minute there, I lost myself".<ref name="Huey"/> It ends with [[audio feedback|feedback]] generated with a [[delay (audio effect)|delay]] effect.<ref name="RANDALL p. 4"/>{{sfn|Footman|2007|p=79}} The title and lyrics to "Karma Police" originate from an [[in-joke]] during ''The Bends'' tour; Jonny Greenwood said "whenever someone was behaving in a particularly shitty way, we'd say 'The [[karma]] police will catch up with him sooner or later.{{'"}}<ref name="MM"/>

====Tracks 7–12====
[[File:Lcii-system.jpg|thumb|A 1990s [[Macintosh LC II]] system. Radiohead used the [[speech synthesis|synthesised voice]] of "Fred", included with older [[Macintosh]] software, to recite the lyrics of "Fitter Happier".<ref name="complete q"/>]]

"Fitter Happier" is a short [[musique concrète]] track that consists of sampled musical and background sound and spoken-word lyrics recited by "Fred",<ref name="complete q" /> a [[speech synthesis|synthesised voice]] from the Macintosh [[SimpleText]] application.{{sfn|Randall|2000|pp=158–159}} Yorke wrote the lyrics "in ten minutes" after a period of [[writer's block]] while the rest of the band were playing.<ref name="Moran_92"/> He described the words as a checklist of slogans for the 1990s; he considered it "the most upsetting thing I've ever written",<ref name="MM">{{citation
 | first = Mark
 | last = Sutherland
 | title = Return of the Mac!
 | date = 31 May 1997
| magazine = [[Melody Maker]]}}</ref> and said it was "liberating" to give the words to a neutral-sounding computer voice.<ref name="Moran_92"/> Among the samples in the background is a loop from the 1975 film ''[[Three Days of the Condor]]''.{{sfn|Randall|2000|pp=158–159}} The band considered using "Fitter Happier" as the album's opening track, but decided the effect was off-putting.<ref name="SELECT"/>

Steve Lowe called the song "penetrating surgery on pseudo-meaningful corporations' lifestyles" with "a repugnance for prevailing yuppified social values".<ref name="LOWE"/> Among the loosely connected imagery of the lyrics, Footman identified the song's subject as "the materially comfortable, morally empty embodiment of modern, Western humanity, half-salaryman, half-[[The Stepford Wives|Stepford Wife]], destined for the metaphorical farrowing crate, propped up on [[Fluoxetine|Prozac]], [[Sildenafil|Viagra]] and anything else his insurance plan can cover."{{sfn|Footman|2007|p=86}} Sam Steele called the lyrics "a stream of received imagery: scraps of media information, interspersed with lifestyle ad slogans and private prayers for a healthier existence. It is the hum of a world buzzing with words, one of the messages seeming to be that we live in such a synthetic universe we have grown unable to detect reality from artifice."<ref name="STEELE">{{citation
 | first = Sam
 | last = Steele
 | title = Grand Control to Major Thom
 | date = July 1997
 | magazine = [[Vox (magazine)|Vox]]}}</ref>

"Electioneering", featuring a [[cowbell (instrument)|cowbell]] and a distorted guitar solo, is the album's most rock-oriented track and one of the heaviest songs Radiohead has recorded.<ref name="Guardian review"/> It has been compared to Radiohead's earlier style on ''Pablo Honey''.{{sfn|Randall|2000|pp=158–159}}{{sfn|Footman|2007|pp=93–94}} The cynical "Electioneering" is the album's most directly political song,<ref name="100 GREATEST Q">{{citation|title=The 100 Greatest Albums in the Universe|magazine=[[Q (magazine)|Q]]|date=February 1998}}</ref><ref name="KUIPERS"/> with lyrics inspired by the [[poll tax riots]].<ref name="Moran_92"/> The song was also inspired by Chomsky's ''[[Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media|Manufacturing Consent]]'', a book analysing contemporary mass media under the [[propaganda model]].<ref name="SAKAMOTO"/> Yorke likened its lyrics, which focus on political and artistic compromise, to "a preacher ranting in front of a bank of microphones".<ref name="WADSWORTH"/>{{sfn|Randall|2000|p=226}} Regarding its oblique political references, Yorke said, "What can you say about the [[International Monetary Fund|IMF]], or politicians? Or people selling arms to African countries, employing slave labour or whatever. What can you say? You just write down '[[Cattle prod]]s and the IMF' and people who know, know."<ref name="IRVIN"/> O'Brien said the song was about the promotional cycle of touring: "After a while you feel like a politician who has to kiss babies and shake hands all day long."<ref name="HUMO"/>

{{Listen
 | filename = Climbing Up the Walls.ogg
 | title = 'Climbing Up the Walls'
 | pos = left
 | description = "Climbing Up the Walls" contains sampled ambient sounds, distorted drums and Jonny Greenwood's [[Krzysztof Penderecki]]-influenced string section. This audio sample is from the beginning of the second chorus to the guitar solo.}}

[[File:Krzysztof Penderecki 20080706.jpg|upright|thumb|''[[Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima]]'' by [[Krzysztof Penderecki]] (''pictured'') inspired the string arrangement on "Climbing Up the Walls".]]

"Climbing Up the Walls" – described by ''[[Melody Maker]]'' as "monumental chaos"<ref name="SUTHERLAND"/> – is layered with a string section, ambient noise and repetitive, metallic percussion. The string section, composed by Jonny Greenwood and written for 16 instruments, was inspired by [[20th-century classical music|modern classical]] composer [[Krzysztof Penderecki]]'s ''[[Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima]]''. Greenwood said, "I got very excited at the prospect of doing string parts that didn't sound like '[[Eleanor Rigby]]', which is what all string parts have sounded like for the past 30 years."<ref name="WADSWORTH"/> ''[[Select (magazine)|Select]]'' described Yorke's distraught vocals and the [[atonality|atonal]] strings as "Thom's voice dissolving into a fearful, blood-clotted scream as Jonny whips the sound of a million dying elephants into a crescendo".<ref name="MORAN"/> For the lyrics, Yorke drew from his time as an orderly in a mental hospital during the [[Care in the Community]] policy of [[deinstitutionalisation|deinstitutionalising]] mental health patients, and a ''[[The New York Times|New York Times]]'' article about serial killers.<ref name="HUMO"/> He said:

{{blockquote|This is about the unspeakable. Literally skull-crushing. I used to work in a mental hospital around the time that Care in the Community started, and we all just knew what was going to happen. And it's one of the scariest things to happen in this country, because a lot of them weren't just harmless&nbsp;... It was hailing violently when we recorded this. It seemed to add to the mood.<ref name="Moran_92"/>}}

"[[No Surprises]]", recorded in a single take,<ref>{{citation
 | first1 = John
 | last1 = Harris
 | first2 = Serge
 | last2 = Simonart
 | title = Everything in Its Right Place
 | date = August 2001
 | magazine = [[Q (magazine)|Q]]}}</ref> is arranged with electric guitar (inspired by the Beach Boys' "[[Wouldn't It Be Nice]]"),{{sfn|Footman|2007|p=110}} acoustic guitar, glockenspiel and vocal harmonies.<ref>{{citation
 | first = Bill
 | last = Janovitz
 | title = No Surprises
 | magazine = [[AllMusic]]
 | url = https://www.allmusic.com/song/no-surprises-t1416673
 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20101210230041/http://allmusic.com/song/no-surprises-t1416673
 | archive-date = 10 December 2010
| url-status = live}}</ref> The band strove to replicate the mood of [[Louis Armstrong]]'s 1968 recording of "[[What a Wonderful World]]" and the soul music of [[Marvin Gaye]].<ref name="HUMO"/> Yorke identified the subject of the song as "someone who's trying hard to keep it together but can't".<ref name="IRVIN" /> The lyrics seem to portray a suicide<ref name="STEELE"/> or an unfulfilling life, and dissatisfaction with contemporary social and political order.{{sfn|Footman|2007|pp=108–109}} Some lines refer to rural<ref name="BERMAN">{{citation
 | first = Stuart
 | last = Berman
 | title = Outsiders
 | date = July 1997
 | magazine = [[ChartAttack|Chart]]}}</ref> or suburban imagery.<ref name="LYNSKEYq"/> One of the key metaphors in the song is the opening line, "a heart that's full up like a [[landfill]]"; according to Yorke, the song is a "fucked-up nursery rhyme" that "stems from my unhealthy obsession of what to do with plastic boxes and plastic bottles&nbsp;... All this stuff is getting buried, the debris of our lives. It doesn't rot, it just stays there. That's how we deal, that's how I deal with stuff, I bury it."<ref>{{cite web
 | first = Ken
 | last = Micallef
 | title = I'm OK, You're OK
 | date = 17 August 1997 | publisher = [[Yahoo! Music Radio|Yahoo! Launch]]
 | url = http://www.music.yahoo.ca/read/interview/12052847
 | archive-url = https://archive.today/20130101173137/http://www.music.yahoo.ca/read/interview/12052847
 | archive-date = 1 January 2013
| url-status = dead
}}</ref> The song's gentle mood contrasts sharply with its harsh lyrics;<ref name="q review"/><ref>{{citation | first = Scott | last = Kara | title = Experimental Creeps | date = September 2000 | url = https://citizeninsane.eu/media/nez/ripitup/pt_2000-09_ripitup.htm | magazine = [[Rip It Up (New Zealand)|Rip It Up]] | access-date = 10 September 2023 | archive-date = 9 December 2021 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20211209015953/https://citizeninsane.eu/media/nez/ripitup/pt_2000-09_ripitup.htm | url-status = dead }}</ref> Steele said, "even when the subject is suicide&nbsp;... O'Brien's guitar is as soothing as balm on a red-raw psyche, the song rendered like a bittersweet child's prayer."<ref name="STEELE"/>

"[[Lucky (Radiohead song)|Lucky]]" was inspired by the [[Bosnian War]]. Sam Taylor said it was "the one track on [''The Help Album''] to capture the sombre terror of the conflict", and that its serious subject matter and dark tone made the band "too 'real' to be allowed on the Britpop gravy train".<ref>{{citation
 | first = Sam
 | last = Taylor
 | title = Gives You the Creeps
 | date = 5 November 1995
| magazine = [[The Observer]]}}</ref> The lyrics were pared down from many pages of notes, and were originally more politically explicit.<ref name="SELECT"/> The lyrics depict a man surviving an aeroplane crash<ref name="100 GREATEST Q"/> and are drawn from Yorke's anxiety about transportation.<ref name="KUIPERS"/> The musical centerpiece of "Lucky" is its three-piece guitar arrangement,<ref name="CAVANAGH"/> which grew out of the high-pitched chiming sound played by O'Brien in the song's introduction,<ref name="SUTCLIFFE"/> achieved by strumming above the [[nut (string instrument)|guitar nut]].<ref name="Fricke's Picks">{{cite magazine|url=https://www.rollingstone.com/music/lists/100-greatest-guitarists-of-all-time-19691231/ed-obrien-20101202|title=Ed O'Brien – 100 Greatest Guitarists: David Fricke's Picks|magazine=[[Rolling Stone]] |access-date=24 August 2015|date=3 December 2010|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150909205556/http://www.rollingstone.com/music/lists/100-greatest-guitarists-of-all-time-19691231/ed-obrien-20101202|archive-date=9 September 2015|url-status=live}}</ref> Critics likened its lead guitar to [[Pink Floyd]] and, more broadly, [[arena rock]].<ref name="nme review"/>{{sfn|Randall|2000|p=161}}<ref>{{citation
 | first = Sam
 | last = Taylor
 | title = Mother, Should I Build a Wall?
 | date = 5 November 1995
| magazine = [[The Observer]]}}</ref><ref>{{citation
 | first = Jim
 | last = Shelley
 | title = Nice Dream?
 | date = 13 July 1996
| magazine = [[The Guardian]]}}</ref>

The album ends with "The Tourist", which Jonny Greenwood wrote as an unusually staid piece where something "doesn't have to happen&nbsp;... every three seconds". He said, {{"'}}The Tourist' doesn't sound like Radiohead at all. It has become a song with space."<ref name="HUMO">{{citation
 | title = Radiohead: The Album, Song by Song, of the Year
 | magazine = [[HUMO]]
 | date = 22 July 1997}}</ref> The lyrics, written by Yorke, were inspired by his experience of watching American tourists in France frantically trying to see as many tourist attractions as possible.<ref name="Moran_92"/> He said it was chosen as the closing track because "a lot of the album was about background noise and everything moving too fast and not being able to keep up. It was really obvious to have 'Tourist' as the last song. That song was written to me from me, saying, 'Idiot, slow down.' Because at that point, I ''needed'' to. So that was the only resolution there could be: to slow down."<ref name="LAUNCH">{{cite web
 | first = Dave
 | last = DiMartino
 | title = Give Radiohead Your Computer
 | publisher = [[Yahoo! Music Radio|Yahoo! Launch]]
 | date = 2 May 1997
| url = http://music.yahoo.com/read/interview/12048024
 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070814183856/http://music.yahoo.com/read/interview/12048024
 | archive-date = 14 August 2007}}</ref> The "unexpectedly bluesy waltz" draws to a close as the guitars drop out, leaving only drums and bass, and concludes with the sound of a small bell.<ref name="CAVANAGH"/>