The Musiquarium

Released: 2025

Genres: Glitch Pop, IDM

The Musiquarium’s ALBUM Review Score: 5 out of 10

Between 2019’s ANIMA and the 2022 debut of Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood’s latest side project, The Smile, Thom Yorke was recording Tall Tales with electronic producer Mark Pritchard. Despite being recorded before any of the three albums from The Smile, it is finally being released five years after its inception.

A Fake in a Faker’s World is a rather mediocre opener, with uncharacteristically cheesy synths for a Thom Yorke project. I’ve never once listened to Radiohead or Thom Yorke and thought that the music didn’t sound futuristic, but with Tall Tales, it all feels like it’s from the past and not just because it’s from 2020 — it feels older than that — Much older.

Back in the Game was the lead single and while it is within the realm of electronica, it sounds nothing like a Thom Yorke song, outside of his recognizable vocals; the song also has more of those horribly dated synthesizers. This was followed by another single, This Conversation Is Missing Your Voice, which was a slightly better single, but the bar is set quite low on this LP.

Gangsters is one of the worst things Thom Yorke has ever had his name attached to, a song bogged down by more dated synths and questionable modulated vocals. There’s some ambient tracks like Ice Shelf, Wandering Genie and the title track, but theses tracks don’t do anything that a song like Treefingers hadn’t already done better 25 years ago. And what the fuck is Happy Days? The best song here and the only one I can see being grouped with Thom Yorke’s other body of work is The Spirit, though even that is lightweight next to a Radiohead or The Smile track.

A 25 year old album like KID A still sounds fresh and exciting today, whereas Tall Tales was stale before it even hit the shelves. I have no idea what the critics are smoking, because this is easily Thom Yorke’s worst project yet and an album that I’d rank far below Pablo Honey and Tomorrow’s Modern Boxes. I can see why this took 5 years to see a release…

For credit breakdowns and historic release details, view Thom Yorke on Discogs.

Back to the 2025 Album Guide or the Thom Yorke Album Reviews page.

Written by Brett Nippard