Nigel Godrich has said that Atoms For Peace initially “generated a lot of crap”.

Speaking to Middle 8 – the publication from online music platform Soundhalo – Godrich and Thom Yorke spoke about the band’s early gestation period. “We generated a lot of crap,” said Godrich. “Thom and I went through everything and we created tracks out of bits of it and started restructuring things. Then by the time we took it back to the guys, they were, ‘Um. Is this me playing right now?’

“It’s a hybrid of electronic stuff and real stuff,” he continued. “So then the next stage is re-learning it as a band to play the stuff that maybe they came up with but it’s been taken apart in a computer and put back together again. It’s a mind blow for [Atoms For Peace members] Joey [Waronker], Mauro [Refosco] and Flea doing it this way around.”

Yorke, meanwhile, said that he had difficulty trying to explain the project to people. “Real Radiohead fans will always know what we’re up to and they’ll get it but generally people don’t know what it is,” he said. “I don’t even know what it is – it’s so hard to explain. I could take a whole interview just trying to explain what we are and how we do what we do. It’s pretty complicated, actually. And it’s been hard to get that across to people.”

Atoms For Peace recently broadcast two shows from their three-night run at the London Roundhouse via the mobile app Soundhalo. The service, which was premiered by Alt-J in May of this year and is aimed at discouraging gig-goers from recording concerts on their phones, allows users to download high quality MP4 videos and audio tracks to their phones as the show they are attending is taking place. Fans are then able to download each track to a desktop or portable device, for 99p per track or £9.99 for the whole performance.

You can read our review of the July 24 Roundhouse show here.

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