I Promise

 


“I know which side I’m spread, I promise

The tantrums and the chitty chat, I promise

Even when the ship is wrecked, I promise

Tie me to the rotten deck, I promise…”

 

     A small tragedy happened while I was inside a pet shop a few weeks ago, trying to buy our dog some food. The song “I Promise” was starting to play somewhere inside the pet shop or outside, I wasn’t sure, but it was abruptly stopped and replaced by a hip-hop song. It would have been a thoroughly miserable moment, if not for a Golden Retriever who was gently rubbing its head on my leg.

     “I Promise” is a Radiohead song. It was slated to be included in the 1997 OK Computer album, but Thom Yorke and the band thought it wasn’t good enough, so they discarded it. Apparently, they had a change of heart regarding the song and decided to include it in the 20th anniversary issue of OK Computer. OK Computer, by the way, is the band’s greatest album.

     When you’re a songwriter, and you think, after writing it, that a song like “I Promise” is not good enough, then you’ve set a standard so high it would knock flying planes off. “I Promise,” in my opinion is a great melancholy track powered by Thom Yorke’s misery-inducing vocals. “The song is about being devoted to someone, almost to an idiosyncratic fault. It details a relationship in which someone makes a declaration after declaration that no matter what happens, they will stay by their partner’s side,” says the lyrics site Genius.

     It could be the anthem of every emotionally tortured lover who wanted to get out of the relationship (“I won’t run away no more, I promise”) but could not because his feelings are already too deep.

    “I Promise” is accompanied by an eerie and creepy music video.

     I went out of the shop singing the song in my head while trying to stop a tear from escaping an eye, the song is that sad.

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