The Pop Corporation

When you’re in a band that’s done rather well out of sloganeering and hitting out at politicians and capitalist society and all that, it’s a bit rich when you suddenly start trying to heal the world by simply shrugging at everything, which is the position Jonny Greenwood seems to find himself in.

Of course, Radiohead have been somewhat political in the past, calling various world leaders ‘liars’ and the like, but Greenwood has felt the need to make a statement about the role of politics in music, saying that they should be a separate thing.

What could have changed his mind in recent years? Well, our Jonny has been accused of basically being a Zionist, thanks to his work with Israeli musicians. That’s a little unfair, as there are dissenting voices within the Israeli community.

However, it takes about 2 seconds of research to find out that he’s married to someone called Sharona Katan and together, they own an olive oil company. The anti-capitalist adjacent guitarist sells 250ml bottles of the stuff will set you back £40, and together, Katan and Greenwood bemoaned their small harvest while Israeli forces targeted Palestine’s ancestral olive trees in Gaza and the West Bank.

In addition to this, Greenwood’s partner has shared numerous posts on Twitter concerning debunked allegations and various propaganda, Islamophobia dating back to 2017 and, while perhaps you shouldn’t tar Greenwood with the same brush as his wife, you can perhaps understand why he’s got a sudden need to start saying things like ‘we should kinda y’know keep politics out of uh music like‘.

While Greenwood was speaking to the Times, he said: “It’s very hard to talk about this, but I think music and art should be above and beyond political concerns.”

He presumably thinks his bandmate – Thom Yorke – should stop speaking about his opposition to the war in Ukraine and climate change, then? Maybe he does.

Still, some of Greenwood’s best friends aren’t Zionists. He continued: “You know, I made an album involving Israeli, Iraqi, Egyptian, and Syrian musicians? If I’m supposed to stop working with musicians because I dislike their governments, then I wouldn’t work with any of them.”

“The fact is, what defines us as musicians isn’t our nationalities. But that point doesn’t seem to get through.”

Unrelated, obviously, but Greenwood recently objected to the use of his music in the film about Melania Trump, asking for a bit of his music to be removed from ‘Phantom Thread’. Political or point of principle? Who knows.