Sep 15, 2011:

@ChieftanMews: 4/10: Leaves fall & then grow again. From the same branches. The sounds they make can change too. .. … Kid is now an Adult?

Tweeted the day before the release of TKOL RMX 1234567 a two-disc CD collating the collection of Remixes of The King of Limbs released between July 4th and October 10th Chieftan Mew’s refers to the remixes in this tweet as growing from the same ‘branches’ as the original songs. Both leaves and branches are a reference to ‘Stems’.

In remixing the term Stems are used to denote the individual parts of a song isolated into separate files to facilitate remixing. Previously with In Rainbows Radiohead had released Stems of both Reckoner and Nude for a remix competition located at RadioheadRemix.com.

( Reckoner Remix’s screenshot from Wired )

While in 2005 Trent Renzor famously experimented with releasing stems of his music for fans Radiohead had previously run a competition in 2003 called ‘The Loophole’ providing samples from Hail To The Thief and offering fans the chance to become ‘a minor celebrity’ by having their remixes featured on the Radiohead website. Unlike other competitions The Loophole contained more then just stems of songs from Hail To The Thief as samples included additional pieces such as offcuts, alternative takes and even one sample that would later turn up in on The Eraser as part of Black Swan. While it’s unknown how many remixes where made there was 100 ‘winners’ featured on the Radiohead.com site.

You can read more about The Loophole and maybe download some of the original stems yourself to mess around with at Citizen Insane.

Last year on twitter Flying Lotus admitted that he too was asked to provide a remix of The King of Limbs but didn’t know where to start with it, he later gave more details in a interview:

Indy: He was also on your last album. Are there any more collaborations like that in the works?

FL: Not that I know of. They wanted me to remix the new Radiohead record, and I’ve been trying to mess with that a little bit. But I haven’t gotten to it yet.

Indy: Tell us what that’ll sound like when you’re done with it?

FL: It’s too early to say, man. I have no fucking clue. It’s difficult to work with, because the pieces that they gave me, there’s no real a cappella. It’s like piano and voice at the same time.

Indy: So you can’t separate them.

FL: No, I can’t. So I have to come up with some shit that’s a little similar to the record, I guess, to an extent.

Source: Colarado Springs Independent )

Kid is now an Adult? refers to Kid A now being over 10 years old, old enough to make them a adult today.

We’d love to hear what answers other people sent to Mew’s ‘quiz’!
Let us know in the comments or email muggs@ersmenoo.com.