Despite the band’s public hatred against their first hit single, Radiohead shocked concert attendees with a bust-out “Creep” performance earlier tonight in Paris at Le Zénith. While we all know it to be the song that initially defined the band and its success, “Creep” hasn’t actually been performed live since August 30, 2009. The band would even describe the single as “crap” and told the Guardian that any fans who requested the song in concert were “anally retarded.” 

Well one fan did make the request, and the band did play it. “This is for the funny guy shouting ‘Creep’ in the back,” Yorke said from the stage. “Only to shock you.” And of course, the crowd went wild.

Watch Prince Cover “Creep” At 2008 Coachella Performance

But how could a band hate their own song so much? In a 1996 feature with the Guardian, frontman Thom Yorke describes how the song popularized the band after the release of their first two EPs, with “Creep” eventually making its way way onto their first full-length album Pablo Honey. With this fame, however, came torrential downfall.

“We sucked Satan’s cock,” Yorke explains about the two-year tour that followed their early success, stunting the creative growth of any new music to come from the band until The Bends came out in 1995. “It took a year-and-a-half to get back to the people we were… to cope with it emotionally.” Guitarist Johnny Greenwood added, “We were like paranoid little mice in cages…We were scared of our instruments, scared of every note not being right.”

In addition to their shocking performance of “Creep,” Radiohead played “True Love Waits” as for the first time in ten years. They also made their tour debuts of “No Surprises” from OK Computer and “Pyramid Song” from Amnesiac, in addition to songs off their new album A Moon Shaped Pool (read the review here). The full set played out as 17 songs, with a 5 song encore, and 2 song second encore, totaling 24 songs. Sounds like Paris had quite the night!

Creep

True Love Waits

No Surprises

Daydreaming

Present Tense

Radiohead in Paris @ Le Zénith 5/23/16:

Burn the Witch
Daydreaming
Decks Dark
Desert Island Disk
Ful Stop
Lotus Flower
The National Anthem
My Iron Lung
No Surprises (First performance since 2009)
Bloom (Happy Birthday sung to Phil)
Identikit
The Numbers
Separator
The Gloaming
Everything in Its Right Place
Idioteque
Bodysnatchers

Encore:
True Love Waits (First full performance since 2006)
Present Tense
Paranoid Android
Tinker Tailor Soldier Sailor Rich Man Poor Man Beggar Man Thief
Weird Fishes/Arpeggi

Encore 2:
Creep (First performance since 2009)
Pyramid Song

[H/T CoS]