When Radiohead released their 1997 masterpiece “Paranoid Android,” lots of critics compared the proggy, dizzying track to another six-minute rock epic: Queen‘s 1975 staple “Bohemian Rhapsody.” The reference was inevitable, given the songs’ similar length and musical ambition, but perhaps the connection is deeper than that. As Radiohead leader Thom Yorke has documented in various interviews over the years, he was massively influenced by Queen as a kid—to the point that, in his quest to emulate that band’s guitarist, Brian May, he even tried to build his own instrument.
“I started playing when I was 7, 8. I was obsessed with Queen when ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ came out,” Yorke recalled during a 2019 appearance on BBC Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs. “I laid down in front of these big speakers in my friend’s house, and we just listened to ‘Bohemian Rhapsody,’ and at that point I decided, ‘Yep, this is what I’m doing.’ And then soon after that, I decided I was gonna do what Brian May did: build a guitar. It sort of worked, but it was literally rough-cut out with a saw. It was terrible. It really wasn’t [impressive]. Shortly after that, my dad felt sorry for me and eventually bought me one.”
As noted by Radiohead fan site Citizen Insane, Yorke also talked about his makeshift guitar during a 1997 interview with Irish publication Hot Press. “I just thought, ‘I want that guitar,’” he said. “In fact, I met him, and I said, ‘You know, you’re the reason I used to spend months and months on end in my garage trying to build a fucking guitar.’ I didn’t have any proper tools. I just had a fucking hacksaw and brass thingies to smooth the edges.” In that same piece, he noted that he remained a Queen fan “to an extent,” highlighting the band’s “professionalism” and the “bewitching” duality of singer Freddie Mercury. “[A]pparently he wouldn’t talk to anyone; he never did interviews; and yet when he appeared on stage he was totally, totally focused and completely rabid—but obviously he was the total opposite of that, totally sensitive and really, really shy,” he said.
That same year, as Radiohead were promoting their massively hyped third album, OK Computer, lots of publications mentioned “Bohemian Rhapsody” in their coverage. Uncut called “Paranoid Android” a “‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ for morbid introverts,” and Spin wrote that the song “piles on tempo changes, messes with dynamics, and withholds a conventional refrain, like ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ without the operatic bits.” Citizen Insane transcribed a hilarious interview with Vox, which includes a section where Radiohead respond to “10 critical quotes, positive and negative, about the album.” The most relevant to our purposes: “RADIOHEAD ARE THE NEW QUEEN AND ‘PARANOID ANDROID’ IS THE ‘BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY’ FOR THE ‘90S.” Yorke’s amusing response: “Yes, please! I’d love that! Wow! Great! I can’t wait to do ‘Another One Bites the Dust’!”
Speaking to Melody Maker, Radiohead guitarist Ed O’Brien acknowledged the Queen inspiration but also pointed to another pivotal influence: Pixies, the quiet-loud alt-rock pioneers. “It’s not a ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ for the [’90s]—it’s just a handy reference point,” he said, per Citizen Insane. “It’s like ‘Creep’ was meant to sound like Scott Walker…it just didn’t come out that way. But ‘Paranoid Android’ is the song we play to people when they want to know what the album is like [because] it should make them think, ‘What the fuck’s going to happen on the rest of the album?’”
Though a lot of the comparisons were majorly overblown, it does seem like the band left an impression on Yorke. During a 1994 performance for MTV, three years before the release of “Paranoid Android,” Radiohead even covered Queen’s 1979 hit “A Crazy Little Thing Called Love.” (Sadly, only a brief snippet of footage appears to have survived.)
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