Director Paul Thomas Anderson has had a long relationship with evergreen alt-rockers Radiohead, mostly through the band’s guitarist, Jonny Greenwood, who’s scored a number of Anderson’s films. Earlier this year, rumors leaked that the Inherent Vice director was working with the band in a more direct fashion, filming a music video for the album that would eventually be released as A Moon Shaped Pool. Said video, “Daydreaming,” came out just a couple of days before the album’s release, featuring frontman Thom Yorke wandering morosely through a variety of washed-out locales.
Today, though, Radiohead revealed that Anderson’s involvement with the album goes even further, releasing a music video for “Present Tense.” But where “Daydreaming” was all about distance, the new video is surprisingly intimate: no flashy camera moves, no narrative conceits, just Greenwood and Yorke, jamming together with a CR78 drum machine. Radiohead has been playing “Present Tense” in concert for a few years now—Yorke played it solo at England’s Latitude Festival way back in 2009—but there’s something strangely warm about the version on display here, with Anderson’s camera capturing Yorke’s silly little dance moves and quietly watching the two old friends play.
A Moon Shaped Pool was a critical and commercial success for Radiohead. The album earned the band yet another Mercury Prize nomination (its fifth), and hit the bestseller charts for both vinyl and digital releases.