Thom Yorke’s been keeping busy. Other than scoring Luca Guadagnino’s remake of 70s horror classic Suspiria, projecting cryptic adverts across London buildings for his solo project ANIMA, and performing in a Paul Thomas Anderson-directed short on Netflix, he’s also contributing a new song to Fight Club actor Edward Norton’s film adaption of Jonathan Lethem’s novel Motherless Brooklyn about a detective in 1950s New York.
The American History X star has been a longtime fan of Yorke, even offering punters the chance to watch Radiohead’s Moon Shaped Pool tour with him at New York’s Madison Square Garden back in 2016. According to Rolling Stone, two versions of Yorke’s new track “Daily Battles” will appear in the film, which will be released in November this year.
“I wanted Thom to write an old-world melancholy ballad, and I wanted his voice to be the properties for (Norton’s character) Lionel’s voice,” Norton told Rolling Stone, “but I sort of said to myself, ‘Yeah, you and everybody else in the world.’” The resulting track “Daily Battles”, which will appear in a jazz bar scene in the film, has also been made into a jazz arrangement by American trumpeter Wynton Marsalis to better fit the scene.
Yorke’s version of the song features none other than his Atom for Peace bandmate, Red Hot Chili Peppers bassist Flea on bass and horns. “He sent me this track on him on the piano singing it and I was sitting on the edge of my bed in the dark, crying from listening to the song,” Norton said. “It’s so instantly heartbreaking and evocative of the themes to the movie without being overly specific to them, but so much so, I thought the idea of daily battles that everyone is fighting, that you’re trying to rise up and out of.”
Both versions will feature in the movie’s soundtrack, and will arrive digitally in the coming weeks. A split 7” vinyl of both tracks will also be released in the US this November.