The band’s song “Let Down” was originally released as a single in 1997, the third from the album OK Computer, but it has just reached the Hot 100 for the first time.
It currently sits at number 91 on the list, having gained a lot of popularity on TikTok.
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The song has had a significant presence on the platform for several months now, especially considering that it is one of Radiohead’s most melancholic songs. TikTok users seem to be taking advantage of the Radiohead-typical feeling of “my heart is stuck in a well and can’t get up” to add more weight to their posts.
This marks only the fourth time Radiohead has appeared on the Hot 100 chart, most recently in 2008 with the song “Nude” from the album In Rainbows.
Here you can listen to the song:
Billboard states that the position on the chart was achieved “almost entirely through streaming”, with 5.2 million streams in the US during the week to August 21. This comes after several weeks of growing popularity for “Let Down” on streaming services.
“Creep”, which famously brought Radiohead breakthrough in the US, actually has significantly more streams per week. But thanks to the way the Billboard Hot 100 is calculated, it doesn’t quite have enough power to return to the chart – it debuted as early as 1993 – according to Billboard data analyst Xander Zellner.
While the band has been largely inactive since 2018, when Radiohead played their last concert, 2025 has proven to be a year of surprising activity for the band.
In addition to topping the charts with a song that’s older than most people who post it on TikTok, Radiohead released a live album called “Hail to the Thief (Live Recordings 2003-2009)” this month. And an exhibition celebrating the band’s long-standing collaboration with artist Stanley Donwood opened at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford earlier in August.
The CD and vinyl releases of “Hail to the Thief (Live Recordings 2003-2009)” will also begin to be sent out on August 31, if you want a physical copy.
The most exciting thing is still in the world of rumours. In March, there was speculation of a full comeback tour for Radiohead as the band members formed a new limited liability company, and later that month, the band’s management team donated Radiohead concert tickets to a charity.
None of this has come to fruition yet, and in a recent interview, Thom Yorke dismissed the idea of the band returning to the studio in the near future. However, if the band does decide to tour again, there may be a surprisingly large number of younger faces in the audience, based on their apparent popularity on social media.
