Military occupation occurs when the control and authority over a territory passes to a hostile army. The territory then becomes occupied territory.

Military occupation and the laws of war

From the second half of the 18th century onwards, international law has come to distinguish between the military occupation of a country and territorial acquisition by invasion and annexation, the difference between the two being originally expounded upon by Emerich de Vattel in The Law of Nations (1758). The distinction then became clear and has been recognized among the principles of international law since the end of the Napoleonic wars in the 19th century. These customary laws of belligerent occupation which evolved as part of the laws of war gave some protection to the population under the military occupation of a belligerent power.

The Hague Conventions of 1907 further clarified and supplemented these customary laws. Specifically "Laws and Customs of War on Land" (Hague IV); October 18, 1907: "Section III Military Authority over the territory of the hostile State." The first two articles of that section state: :Art. 42. :Territory is considered occupied when it is actually placed under the authority of the hostile army. :The occupation extends only to the territory where such authority has been established and can be exercised.

:''Art. 43. :The authority of the legitimate power having in fact passed into the hands of the occupant, the latter shall take all the measures in his power to restore, and ensure, as far as possible, public order and safety, while respecting, unless absolutely prevented, the laws in force in the country.

In 1949 these laws governing belligerent occupation of an enemy state's territory were further extended by the adoption of the Fourth Geneva Convention (GCIV). Much of GCIV is relevant to protected persons in occupied territories and Section III: Occupied territories is a specific section covering the issue.

Article 6 restricts the length of time that most of GCIV applies: :The present Convention shall apply from the outset of any conflict or occupation mentioned in Article 2. :In the territory of Parties to the conflict, the application of the present Convention shall cease on the general close of military operations. :In the case of occupied territory, the application of the present Convention shall cease one year after the general close of military operations; however, the Occupying Power shall be bound, for the duration of the occupation, to the extent that such Power exercises the functions of government in such territory, by the provisions of the following Articles of the present Convention: 1 to 12, 27, 29 to 34, 47, 49, 51, 52, 53, 59, 61 to 77, 143.

GCIV emphasised an important change in international law. The United Nations Charter (June 26, 1945) had prohibited war of aggression (See articles 1.1, 2.3, 2.4) and GCIV Article 47, the first paragraph in Section III: Occupied territories, restricted the territorial gains which could be made through war by stating: :Protected persons who are in occupied territory shall not be deprived, in any case or in any manner whatsoever, of the benefits of the present Convention by any change introduced, as the result of the occupation of a territory, into the institutions or government of the said territory, nor by any agreement concluded between the authorities of the occupied territories and the Occupying Power, nor by any annexation by the latter of the whole or part of the occupied territory. Article 49 prohibits the forced mass movement of people out of or into occupied state's territory: :Individual or mass forcible transfers, as well as deportations of protected persons from occupied territory to the territory of the Occupying Power or to that of any other country, occupied or not, are prohibited, regardless of their motive. ... The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.

Protocol I (1977): "Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts" has additional articles which cover military occupation but many countries including the U.S. are not signatory to this additional protocol.

In the situation of a territorial cession as the result of war, the specification of a "receiving country" in the peace treaty merely means that the country in question is authorized by the international community to establish civil government in the territory. The military government of the principal occupying power will continue past the point in time when the peace treaty comes into force, until it is legally supplanted.

"Military government continues until legally supplanted" is the rule, as stated in Military Government and Martial Law, by William E. Birkhimer, 3rd edition 1914.

Examples of military occupations

In most wars some territory is placed under the authority of the hostile army. Most military occupations end with the cessation of hostilities. In some cases the occupied territory is returned and in others the land remains under the control of the occupying power but usually not as militarily occupied territory. Sometimes the status of presences is disputed by a party to the situation.

See also

Occupied territory

Rule of Law in Armed Conflicts Project (RULAC)

Military government

Nazi-occupied Europe

Eastern Bloc

Soviet Imperialism

Allied Occupation Zones in Germany

Occupied Japan

Palestinian territories

Further reading

Occupied territory - the legal issues , legal provisions regarding occupation of territory by hostile power and implications for people protected by IHL.

David Kretzmer, Occupation of Justice: The Supreme Court of Israel and the Occupied Territories, State University of New York Press, April, 2002, trade paperback, 262 pages, ISBN 0-7914-5338-3; hardcover, July, 2002, ISBN 0-7914-5337-5

Sander D. Dikker Hupkes, What Constitutes Occupation? Israel as the occupying power in the Gaza Strip after the Disengagement, Leiden: Jongbloed 2008, 110 pages, ISBN 9789070062453 Openacces

Belligerent Occupation

The Law of Belligerent Occupation Michal N. Schmitt (regarding occupation of Iraq)

Law of Belligerent Occupation, Judge Advocate General's School, United States Army

Footnotes

Attribution

Original content adapted from the Wikinfo article, "wikinfo:Belligerent occupation"

ar:احتلال bg:Окупация ca:Ocupació militar cs:Okupace da:Okkupation de:Okkupation et:Okupatsioon es:Ocupación militar eo:Okupado fr:Occupation ko:점령 hr:Okupacija it:Occupazione militare he:כיבוש ka:ოკუპაცია kk:Оккупация lv:Okupācija lt:Okupacija nl:Bezetting (militair) ja:占領 no:Okkupasjon nn:Okkupasjon nrm:Otchupâtion pl:Okupacja wojenna pt:Ocupação estrangeira ru:Оккупация sk:Vojenská okupácia sl:Okupacija sr:Ратна окупација sh:Ratna okupacija fi:Miehitys sv:Ockupation uk:Окупація zh:军事占领

Coordinates	29°25′″N98°30′″N
name	Peter Schiff
school tradition	Austrian School
color	firebrick
birth date	March 23, 1963
nationality	United States
field	Financial Economics
religion	Jewish
alma mater	U.C. Berkeley (B.B.A.), 1987
influences	Irwin Schiff, Ludwig von Mises, F.A. Hayek, Murray Rothbard
opposed	John Maynard Keynes, Alan Greenspan, Ben Bernanke, Paul Krugman, Christopher Dodd, Barack Obama,
signature	}}

Peter David Schiff (; born March 23, 1963) is an American businessman, author and financial commentator. Schiff is CEO and chief global strategist of Euro Pacific Capital Inc., a broker-dealer based in Westport, Connecticut and CEO of Euro Pacific Precious Metals, LLC, a gold and silver dealer based in New York City.

Schiff frequently appears as a guest on CNBC, Fox News, and Bloomberg Television and is often quoted in major financial publications and is a frequent guest on internet radio as well as the host of the former podcast Wall Street Unspun, which is now broadcast on terrestrial radio and known as The Peter Schiff Show. In 2010 Schiff ran as a candidate in the Republican primary for the United States Senate seat from Connecticut.

Schiff is known for his bearish views on the dollar and dollar denominated assets, while bullish on investment in tangible assets as well as foreign stocks and currencies.

Early life and education

The son of Irwin Schiff, a prominent figure in the United States tax protester movement, Peter Schiff was born and raised in New Haven, Connecticut. Schiff graduated from the University of California, Berkeley in 1987 with a Bachelor's degree in finance and accounting.

Financial career

Schiff began his career as a financial consultant at a Shearson Lehman Brothers brokerage. In 1996 Schiff and a partner acquired a small brokerage firm that had been founded in 1980, reincorporated it in California and renamed it Euro Pacific Capital. The company today has more than 15,000 clients and six offices nationwide, with its headquarters in Westport, Connecticut.

According to a 2005 article in The Advocate of Stamford, Connecticut Schiff relocated the firm to Darien, Connecticut to find brokers "who think like him". The New York Metropolitan Area, Schiff says, has the biggest concentration of brokers in the country, making it easier to recruit employees. The company has offices in Newport Beach, California as well as in Scottsdale, Arizona, Palm Beach, Florida, Los Angeles and New York. Euro Pacific Capital also holds the exclusive rights to broker some Perth Mint gold products in the United States.

Economic forecasting

Peter Schiff specializes in the understanding of the Austrian School, a school of economic thought generally categorized as heterodox (or non-mainstream). Schiff voices strong support for the Austrian School, and says it was first introduced to him by his father, Irwin Schiff..

U.S. bear market

In his 2007 book, Crash Proof, Schiff writes that the current United States economic policies are fundamentally unsound, and predicts that in the future the United States dollar will lose much of its value.

Schiff believes that the imbalance between the amount of goods the U.S. consumes and what it produces will eventually lead to problems for the U.S. economy. As a remedy Schiff favors increased personal savings and production which he says will stimulate economic growth. Schiff cites the U.S.'s low personal savings rate as one of the causes of its transformation from the world's largest creditor nation in the 1970s to the largest debtor nation in the year 2000. Schiff attributes the low savings rate to higher inflation and the artificially low interest rates set by the Federal Reserve.

In a 2002 interview with Southland Today, Schiff predicted that the economic downturn triggered by the bursting of the stock market bubble would lead to a bear market likely to last "another 5 to 10 years." In November 2002, US stocks began a bull market uptrend which held steady for at least five years, until reversing course in 2008, when the Dow, NASDAQ, and S&P; 500 began a decline to less than half of their peak 2008 values, followed in 2009 by the Dow climbing 61% from its low point over the following year. After interviewing Schiff in 2009, journalist and finance author Eric Tyson, referenced various Schiff predictions during the 2000s and stated that "On all of these counts, Schiff wasn't just wrong but ended up being hugely wrong." Schiff later released a video stating that, "When I gave that interview in 2002, I had no way of knowing how irresponsible the Fed was going to be ... But I recognized that early: back in 2003 and 2004 I changed my forecast ... if you look at what happened to the Dow in terms of gold [and not U.S. dollars], my forecast was extremely accurate."

In an August 2006 interview he said: "The United States economy is like the Titanic and I am here with the lifeboat trying to get people to leave the ship... I see a real financial crisis coming for the United States." On December 31, 2006 in debate on Fox News, Schiff forecast that "what's going to happen in 2007" is that "real estate prices are going to come crashing back down to Earth".

As part of these exchanges on Fox News and his repeated appearances on financial news network CNBC, Schiff had mentioned factors such as speculators and "the absence of lending standards" which are now seen by many to indeed be contributing factors to the housing crisis which began in 2007. On December 13, 2007 in a Bloomberg interview on the show Open Exchange, Schiff further added that he felt that the crisis would extend to the credit card lending industry. Following this observation, it was soon reported on December 23, 2007 by the Associated Press that "The value of credit card accounts at least 30 days late jumped 26 percent to $17.3 billion in October from a year earlier at 17 large credit card trusts examined by the AP... At the same time, defaults -- when lenders essentially give up hope of ever being repaid and write off the debt -- rose 18 percent to almost $961 million in October, according to filings made by the trusts with the Securities and Exchange Commission."

Since 2007, Schiff has stated many times that if the government doesn't change course there will be hyperinflation in the US. Schiff is one of a minority of economists credited with accurately predicting the financial crisis of 2007–2010 while "nearly all [macroeconomists] failed to foresee the recession despite plenty of warning signs". In his book Crash Proof, he described several aspects of the U.S. economy that would lead to a recession.

Online videos

Schiff's notoriety for financial predictions increased when a You Tube video entitled "Peter Schiff was right" became popular in late 2008 and 2009. The video consists of a compilation of clips of his many appearances on various financial news programs from networks including CNBC, Fox News, MSNBC and Bloomberg, most of which took place from 2005 to 2007. In the segments Schiff explains specifically the fundamental problems he saw with the United States economy at that time. Schiff's warnings of a coming economic collapse earned him the moniker "Dr. Doom."

In late 2006, Schiff predicted the housing bubble and resulting subprime mortgage crisis, and in late 2008, he predicted the automotive industry crisis and the crisis in the banking and financial markets.

Investment advice

Despite predictions regarding the housing bubble and automotive industry difficulties coming to fruition, as early as 2009 Schiff was receiving criticism due to the performance of some of his client's accounts in 2008, as well as controversies over the predictions themselves. In January 2009, economic blogger and investment adviser Michael Shedlock reported, "I have talked with many who claim they have invested with Schiff and are down anywhere from 40% to 70% in 2008." Other criticisms followed, including the aforementioned Eric Tyson post as well as an article for the investment news site Seeking Alpha, published on the site two days after Shedlock's blog post. Later that week an article appeared in the Wall Street Journal reporting that Schiff's broker-dealer firm, Euro Pacific Capital Inc., "advised its clients to bet that the dollar would weaken significantly and that foreign stocks would outpace their U.S. peers" and that instead, the dollar advanced against most currencies, "magnifying the losses from foreign stocks Mr. Schiff steered his investors into."

The Director of Communications at Schiff's investment firm responded to the original Shedlock piece by saying, "While it is true, that our accounts have suffered badly in 2008, a fact that we have never disputed or ran from, [Shedlock's] estimates for the size of our typical client losses are exaggerated and unfair." Schiff personally responded to Shedlock's criticism by saying, "to examine the effectiveness of my investment strategy immediately following a major correction by looking only at those accounts who adopted the strategy at the previous peak is unfair and distortive" and called Shedlock's blog entry "nothing more than an overt advertisement (and a highly deceptive one at that) to use my popularity to advance his career," adding that losses were felt mostly by recent clients and not by others.

Schiff responded similarly to criticisms made by Wade Slome of Sidoxia Capital Management, LLC. in a September 2009 blog entry entitled, "The Emperor Schiff Has No Clothes." Schiff stated not only were the losses suffered by his clients in 2008 highly exaggerated, but also that most of those losses have already been recouped, stating that many who where down then are now up, and most long-term clients were never down at all, but merely temporarily lost some of the profits they had earned over the years.

The January 2009 Wall Street Journal article discussed the value of Schiff's predictions, and stated how deficiencies "made mincemeat of investors who took his advice in 2008." In an interview the following week Schiff likened himself to billionaire investor Warren Buffett saying they were both "buy and hold" long-term investors. Contrasting his negative press he compared claims about accounts managed under Schiff's firm to the stock market value of Warren Buffett's company, saying: "His approach is you buy stocks and you never sell them—you hope to never sell them—and Berkshire Hathaway is down 40% in the last thirteen months; I don't see the Wall Street Journal saying 'Warren Buffett made mincemeat out of his clients.'" The Wall Street Journal also published a letter written by Schiff in response to his critics saying: "My central investing premise, a weakening dollar and safety in gold, commodities and foreign stocks, didn't materialize in 2008. But all the ingredients were (and remain) present for those movements to occur. Over the past year, market reactions that I didn't foresee—massive global deleveraging, a knee-jerk 'flight to quality' into U.S. Treasuries and a sharp counter trend rally in the U.S. dollar—have kept the scenario from playing out."

In a November 2009 videoblog, Schiff said that five stocks he picked for Fortune Magazine in January 2009 had gained a total of 360%.

In a March 2009 speech Schiff said that it would be impossible for the U.S. debt to China to be repaid unless the U.S. dollar's value is substantially diluted through inflation.

In September 2009 Schiff said that "I would not be surprised to see [gold] at $5,000 over the next several years" and that the 2009 stock market rally was a "bear market rally".

Political career

Schiff was an economic adviser to Ron Paul's 2008 presidential campaign. In support of Paul's economic revitalization plan, he said: "We need a plan that stimulates savings and production, not more of the reckless borrowing and consumption that got us into this mess in the first place. Ron Paul's plan is the only one that amounts to a step in the right direction. If you want meaningful change—for the better that is—Ron Paul is the only candidate capable of delivering it."

In 2008, Schiff also endorsed Murray Sabrin for the U.S. Senate seat in New Jersey.

In an interview in February 2009, Schiff's position was summarized as a nonpartisan critique of American policymakers, comparing former presidents George W. Bush to Herbert Hoover and President Barack Obama to former president Franklin D. Roosevelt, with neither of the more recent incumbents comparing favorably to the earlier ones.

Schiff supports the reduction of government economic regulation, and is concerned that President Obama's administration may increase such regulation.

Schiff says that the current economic crisis provides an opportunity to transition from borrowing and spending, to saving and producing. Schiff is critical of the U.S. government's efforts to "ease the pain" with economic stimulus packages and bailouts. According to Schiff, the U.S. government's approach of replacing "legitimate savings with a printing press" could result in hyperinflation.

2010 U.S. Senate campaign

In December 2008, Connecticut citizens created a website encouraging Schiff to campaign against the incumbent Senator Christopher Dodd. Approximately 5,000 people made campaign contributions using the web site. On February 21, 2009, a moneybomb raised over $20,000 for Schiff's campaign. In a May 2009 video blog, Schiff said that he was seriously considering a run for the senate and when questioned by a Washington Post reporter, he said the chance of him entering politics was "better than 50-50". In June 2009 Schiff commissioned a poll of likely voters which indicated that he trailed Dodd in popularity by four percentage points. On July 9, 2009, Schiff launched an exploratory committee and an official campaign website. He began accepting donations in an attempt to see if "people who really believe in freedom, liberty, sound money and the constitution are prepared to support that with an actual political contribution or to volunteer their services and work on this campaign." He received over 10,000 donations and many e-mails from around the world.

After giving some hints on The Daily Show Schiff officially announced his candidacy for the Republican nomination on September 17, 2009, during the MSNBC Morning Joe show. By October 2009 Schiff had received more than 10,000 telephone calls and letters and raised over $1,960,000 (USD) in campaign contributions.

At the May 2010 Republican convention, Linda McMahon received the most delegate votes but not enough to prevent an August primary election. U.S. Rep. Rob Simmons received more than the required 15 percent of the total votes necessary to force the primary. Schiff then collected the signatures necessary to earn a position on the August 2010 GOP primary ballot, submitting at least 400 signatures over the state requirement.

In July 2010, Schiff's campaign received endorsements from Steve Forbes and Ron Paul.

In the Republican primary, held on August 10, 2010, Schiff lost the nomination to Linda McMahon.

The results were:

49% Linda McMahon

28% Rob Simmons

23% Peter Schiff

Ultimately, the election was won by the Democratic Party primary winner, Richard Blumenthal.

Recognition

In 2011 Peter Schiff was listed as one of the Who's Who of Wall Street

Books

Peter Schiff is the author of five books published by John Wiley & Sons. His book, Crash Proof 2.0, appeared on both the New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller lists.

Crash Proof: How to Profit From the Coming Economic Collapse, February 2007, ISBN 978-0-470-04360-8 1

The Little Book of Bull Moves in Bear Markets: How to Keep your Portfolio Up When the Market is Down, 2008, ISBN 978-0-470-38378-0 2

Crash Proof 2.0: How to Profit From the Economic Collapse, 2nd Edition, September 2009, ISBN 978-0-470-47453-2 3

The Little Book of Bull Moves, Updated and Expanded: How to Keep Your Portfolio Up When the Market Is Up, Down, Or Sideways, 2010, ISBN 0470643994 4

How an Economy Grows and Why it Crashes, 2010, ISBN 978-0-470-52670-5 5

Notes

References

External links

Euro Pacific Capital US Brokerage Firm Website

Euro Pacific Precious Metals Coin Company Website

Schiff for Senate Official Campaign Website

Peter Schiff Online, Official book site for Peter Schiff

Peter Schiff radio, Schiff's daily radio show

Peter Schiff blog

The Peter Schiff Blog

Social media

Peter Schiff's Official YouTube channel

Category:American economics writers Category:American economists Category:American finance and investment writers Category:American Jews Category:American libertarians Category:American money managers Category:Austrian School economists Category:Classical liberals Category:Connecticut Republicans Category:Financial analysts Category:Libertarian economists Category:Microeconomists Category:People from New Haven, Connecticut Category:People from New York City Category:Stock and commodity market managers Category:University of California, Berkeley alumni Category:Writers from Connecticut Category:1964 births Category:Living people

cs:Peter Schiff da:Peter Schiff de:Peter Schiff (Ökonom) es:Peter Schiff fr:Peter Schiff nl:Peter D. Schiff (econoom) ja:ピーター・シフ pl:Peter Schiff pt:Peter Schiff fi:Peter Schiff uk:Пітер Шифф

Coordinates	29°25′″N98°30′″N
name	Thom Yorke
background	solo_singer
birth name	Thomas Edward Yorke
Alias	Tchock, Tchocky, Dr. Tchock
born	October 07, 1968Wellingborough, Northamptonshire, England
Alma mater	University of Exeter
instrument	Vocals, guitar, piano, keyboards, bass guitar, sampler, programming, laptop, percussion, organ, drums
genre	Alternative rock, electronic music
occupation	Musician, singer, songwriter
years active	1985–present
label	XL
associated acts	Radiohead, Atoms for Peace, Unkle, Björk, Flying Lotus, PJ Harvey, Drugstore
notable instruments	Fender TelecasterGibson ES-335Gibson SGFender JazzmasterEpiphone CasinoRickenbacker 330Gibson HummingbirdTaylor Big BabyRhodes piano }}

Thomas Edward "Thom" Yorke (born 7 October 1968) is an English musician who is the lead vocalist and principal songwriter of the alternative rock band Radiohead. He mainly plays guitar and piano, but he has also played drums and bass guitar (notably during the Kid A and Amnesiac sessions). In July 2006, he released his debut solo album, The Eraser.

Yorke has been cited among the most influential figures in the music industry: in 2002, Q Magazine named Yorke the most powerful British musician and in 2005, Radiohead was ranked #73 in Rolling Stones "100 Greatest Artists of All Time" list. Yorke has also been cited among the greatest singers in the history of popular music: in 2005, a poll organised by Blender and MTV2 saw Yorke voted the 18th greatest singer of all time, and in 2008, he was ranked 66th in Rolling Stone's "100 Greatest Singers of all Time". Allmusic wrote: "Few rock singers of the '90s were as original and instantly unforgettable as Thom Yorke."

Life and career

Early years

Yorke was born in Wellingborough, Northamptonshire. At birth, his left eye was fixed shut; his doctors believed that the eye was paralyzed, and that the condition would be permanent. Yorke's parents took him to an eye specialist, who suggested a muscle graft. Yorke underwent five eye operations before he was six years old. Yorke's father, a chemical equipment salesman, was hired by a firm in Scotland shortly after his son's birth and the family lived there until Yorke was seven. During this time Yorke had to wear a patch over his eye. He has stated that the last surgery was "botched", leaving him with a drooping eyelid.

Yorke's family moved frequently; Yorke would move from school to school, where classmates teased him because of his eye problems. The family finally settled in Oxfordshire in 1978. He attended the all boys public school Abingdon where he met future band members Ed O'Brien, Phil Selway, Colin Greenwood and Colin's younger brother, Jonny. Yorke and his friends formed a band named On A Friday, as Friday was the only day on which the members were allowed to rehearse. Yorke, in this early line up, played guitar and provided vocals because "Nobody else would do it", and was already developing his songwriting and lyrical skills. Yorke, speaking about music's influence on him as a schoolboy, said, "School was bearable for me because the music department was separate from the rest of the school. It had pianos in tiny booths, and I used to spend a lot of time hanging around there after school."

After leaving school, Yorke postponed going to university for a year. During that time he worked in a few jobs and was involved in a car accident that made him wary of any kind of mechanised transport. Yorke left Oxford to study at the University of Exeter in late 1988, which as a result put On a Friday on hiatus aside from holiday break rehearsals. While at Exeter, Yorke worked as a DJ at Guild nights in the Lemon Grove and played briefly with the band Headless Chickens. Yorke also met Rachel Owen, whom he began dating.

Radiohead

On A Friday resumed activity in 1991 as the members were finishing their degree courses. Now relocated to Oxford, they signed to Parlophone and changed their name to Radiohead. Around this time, Yorke said he "hit the self-destruct button pretty quickly"; he drank heavily, which resulted in him randomly cutting his hair off and being too drunk to perform onstage.

Radiohead first gained notice with the worldwide hit single "Creep", which later appeared on the band's 1993 debut album Pablo Honey. Yorke admitted later that the success had fed his ego; he tried to project himself as a rock star, which included bleaching his hair and wearing extensions. He said, "When I got back to Oxford I was unbearable . . . [A]s soon as you get any success you disappear up your own arse and lost it forever."

By the time of their second album, The Bends (1995), the band, through frequent touring and greater attention to detail in the recording studio, had picked up a large cult fan base and had begun to receive wider critical acclaim. After the album's release, the American group R.E.M. picked Radiohead as its opening act for the European leg of their tour. While on tour Yorke and R.E.M. singer Michael Stipe became close friends; in particular, Stipe gave him advice on how to deal with the demands of being in a rock band. During the production of the band's third album, OK Computer (1997), all five members had differing opinions and equal production roles, with Yorke having "the loudest voice", according to guitarist Ed O'Brien. After the album was finished, Yorke and Jonny Greenwood contributed to the Velvet Goldmine soundtrack along with other musicians under the moniker Venus in Furs. Upon release, OK Computer was heralded as a landmark album by nearly every publication that reviewed it, establishing Radiohead as one of the leading alternative rock acts of the 1990s. But Yorke was ambivalent about this success. Some of these concerns were voiced in the documentary film Meeting People Is Easy, which focused on the period. Yorke has explained in various interviews that he dislikes the "mythology" within the rock genre, and hates the media's obsession with celebrities.

Yorke and the band adopted a more radical approach on 2000's Kid A and 2001's Amnesiac, processing vocals, obscuring lyrics, and departing from rock for a more varied musical landscape including electronic, jazz and avant-garde classical influences. The albums expanded Radiohead's sales while earning acclaim for experimentation, but also divided fans and critics. In 2003, Radiohead released their sixth album, Hail to the Thief, a blend of rock and electronica that Yorke described as a reaction to the events of the early 2000s and newfound fears for his children's future, though he denied a specific political intent. The band continued to tour, and in 2005 they undertook recording sessions for a seventh album, In Rainbows, released as a DRM-free download in October 2007. In February 2011, the band released their eighth studio album, The King of Limbs, via digital download.

Solo work

Yorke released his solo album, The Eraser, in 2006. Produced by Nigel Godrich and featuring cover art by Stanley Donwood, it was released on the independent label XL Recordings. Yorke described the album as "more beats and electronics" and denied that it meant he was leaving Radiohead, saying, "I want no crap about me being a traitor or whatever splitting up blah blah... this was all done with their blessing." The Eraser reached number 3 in the UK in its first week and number 2 in the United States, Canada and Australia, as well as number 9 on the Irish charts. The album was on the prestigious Mercury Prize shortlist and was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Alternative Music Album.

Yorke rarely plays as a solo act, having never embarked on a solo tour. He has sometimes played short acoustic sets of Radiohead songs in the band's webcasts and television appearances, and occasionally on his own at rallies. However, he did play solo sets at the 2002 Bridge School Benefit concerts organised by Neil Young. In 2006, he performed stripped-down versions of several songs from The Eraser ("Analyse", "The Clock", "Skip Divided" and "Cymbal Rush") on radio and TV programmes, and since then he has played and sung "Cymbal Rush" as an encore at some Radiohead concerts. In July 2009, Yorke played a rare solo performance at the Latitude Festival in England. In February 2010, Yorke played a solo show for the Green Party at the Cambridge Corn Exchange, where he played select Radiohead songs and songs from The Eraser, as well as five entirely new songs: "The Daily Mail", "Lotus Flower", "Give Up The Ghost", "I Froze Up", and "Mouse, Dog, Bird".

On 21 September 2009 Yorke released a new double-A side single, "Feeling Pulled Apart by Horses / The Hollow Earth". It was later announced that he has established an unnamed band with Flea of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Joey Waronker of R.E.M. and Beck, Mauro Refosco of Forro in the Dark and producer Nigel Godrich. They played two sold out shows at the Orpheum Theatre in Los Angeles on 4 and 5 October 2009. Two days before, Yorke also played a "warm-up" show at the Echoplex in Los Angeles. On 25 February 2010, Yorke officially gave the band the name Atoms for Peace.

In June 2010, Yorke attracted some notoriety when he stated in an interview that "It will be only a matter of time - months rather than years - before the music business establishment completely folds" and that such an event will be of "no great loss to the world". Yorke's quote quickly caused a stir of buzz on the blogosphere, with critics both praising and criticising his frankness.

Collaborations

Aside from his own solo work, Yorke has collaborated with several artists. He sang backing vocals on PJ Harvey's Mercury Prize-winning 2000 album Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea and sung a duet with Harvey on one of her songs, "This Mess We're In". In the same year, he also appeared on Björk's soundtrack album Selmasongs, singing "I've Seen It All" with her. The Oscar-nominated song was written for Dancer in the Dark, a film starring Björk, and Yorke's part is sung in the film by actor Peter Stormare; due to time constraints, Björk performed it alone at the 2001 Academy Awards. The two worked together again in 2008 on a charity single called "Náttúra".

Yorke also sang covers of the Roxy Music songs "2HB", "Ladytron" and "Bitter-Sweet" for the 1998 film Velvet Goldmine, as part of Venus in Furs. The band existed solely for the film's soundtrack and also consisted of Radiohead's Jonny Greenwood, Suede's Bernard Butler, and Roxy Music's Andy Mackay. Yorke was duplicating Bryan Ferry's original vocals. Two other cover songs were performed by Venus in Furs, with vocals by actor Jonathan Rhys Meyers in the film; Yorke never appeared onscreen.

Examples of Yorke's other collaborations are the 1998 single "Rabbit in Your Headlights", which he sang and co-wrote with DJ Shadow and which closes Psyence Fiction, the debut album by the group UNKLE; "El President", a 1998 duet with Isabel Monteiro of the band Drugstore, which was also released as a single; and vocals on the 2007 track "The White Flash", by the electronic music group Modeselektor, from their album Happy Birthday. Yorke has also collaborated with Stanley Donwood on a picture book entitled Dead Children Playing. Yorke also covered lead vocal duties on "...And the World Laughs with You" from the 2010 Flying Lotus album Cosmogramma.

In 2010, Yorke worked with Bryan Ferry, Mark Ronson, Bob Hoskins, Andy Murray, and David Cameron to release the charity single "2 Minute Silence"—a track composed entirely of silence—to raise money for the families of British troops released on Remembrance Day, 7 November. The song peaked in the UK Singles Chart at number 20.

In 2011, Yorke lent vocals to two tracks, "Ego" and "Mirror", created through a collaboration between Burial and Four Tet. The songs were debuted on the radio station, Rinse FM, before being released on vinyl.

Atoms for Peace

On 25 February 2010 Yorke revealed the name of his new band—"Atoms for Peace"—and announced a series of U.S. tour dates. Yorke first introduced the band late in 2009. It includes Flea of the Red Hot Chili Peppers on bass, R.E.M. all-round session drummer Joey Waronker, percussionist Mauro Refosco of the musical collective Forro in the Dark and Radiohead producer Nigel Godrich on keyboards and treatments. When the band officially debuted in Los Angeles last October, it was billed with question marks due to it being unnamed. In a note on Radiohead's website, Yorke wrote; "It has been decided that we call ourselves Atoms For Peace. hope you like the name. it seemed bleedin' obvious." Atoms for Peace is a track on Yorke's 2006 solo album The Eraser. Yorke said the band would play eight dates starting in New York on 5 April before hitting the three-day 2010 Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in Indio, California on 18 April. Radiohead recently took a break from recording, but performed a Haiti relief fund-raising concert in Los Angeles in January.

Personal life

Yorke currently lives in Oxford with his long-time girlfriend, Rachel Owen, who obtained a Ph.D. from the University of London for research on the illustrations to Dante's Divine Comedy, having previously studied fine art printmaking at the University of Exeter and painted at the Accademia delle Arti del Disegno, Florence. They have two children, Noah, born in 2001, and Agnes, born 2004. He has one brother, Andy, ex-vocalist of the band Unbelievable Truth.

In 2005, Yorke became a spokesman for Friends of the Earth and their campaign to reduce carbon emissions, The Big Ask.

Yorke often pays tribute to his children while performing live; during songs at the 2006 Bonnaroo Festival, Yorke played with guitar picks imprinted with Agnes' fingerprints.

Musical approach

Vocal characteristics

As a singer, Yorke is recognisable by his distinctive tenor voice, vibrato, frequent use of falsetto, and ability to reach and sustain notes over a wide vocal range. During the recording sessions for The Bends in 1994, Radiohead watched Jeff Buckley in concert; Yorke later said the concert directly influenced his vocal delivery on "Fake Plastic Trees". However, Yorke has said, "It annoys me how pretty my voice is... how polite it can sound when perhaps what I'm singing is deeply acidic." He has explored other styles of singing, such as the aggressive shouting in "Paranoid Android" and semi-spoken vocals in "Myxomatosis" and "A Wolf at the Door".

Musicianship

Aside from vocal duties and writing lyrics, Yorke's musical contributions to Radiohead include guitar and piano. He also plays bass guitar on occasion (the bass line for "The National Anthem" was recorded by him) as well as drums; during the 2006 and 2008–2009 tours he performed percussion on stage in tandem with drummer Phil Selway on the track "Bangers & Mash".

Yorke, unlike the other members of Radiohead, has never learned how to read music. He said, "If someone lays the notes on a page in front of me, it's meaningless... because to me you can't express the rhythms properly like that. It's a very ineffective way of doing it, so I've never really bothered picking it up."

Since Kid A, Radiohead, and in particular Yorke, have incorporated elements of electronic music into their work. As a result, Yorke has taken an increased role in programming beats and samples and has been credited with playing "laptop" on recent albums. On a radio show in 2003 to publicise the release of Hail to the Thief, Yorke remarked that he would rather make a record just with a computer than with only an acoustic guitar. His solo effort The Eraser featured piano, bass and guitar, but was built primarily around electronics.

In interviews Yorke has cited a variety of personal musical heroes and influences, including jazz composer and bassist Charles Mingus, Neil Young, Miracle Legion, singer Scott Walker, electronic acts Aphex Twin and Autechre, and Krautrock band Can. Talking Heads, Queen, Joy Division, Magazine, Elvis Costello, The Smiths and Sonic Youth were early influences on Radiohead and Yorke. In 2004, at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, Yorke mentioned to the crowd, "When I was in college, the Pixies and R.E.M. changed my life.".

Activism

Yorke has spoken out on various political and social issues. Radiohead had read No Logo by Naomi Klein during the Kid A sessions ("No Logo" was also briefly considered as the album title) and all the members were reportedly heavily influenced by it, though Yorke said it "didn't teach him anything he didn't already know". Yorke's activism in support of fair trade practices, with an anti-WTO and anti-globalisation stance, garnered significant attention in the early 2000s. Yorke had previously referenced maquiladoras in the title of a Radiohead B-side in 1995, and decried the IMF in 1997's "Electioneering". Yorke is also a professed fan of Noam Chomsky's political writings, and is a vegan.

Yorke is also notable as a political activist on behalf of other causes, including human rights and anti-war movements such as Jubilee 2000, Amnesty International and CND, and Friends of the Earth's Big Ask campaign. Radiohead played at the Free Tibet concert in both 1998 and 1999, and at an Amnesty International concert in 1998. In 2005, Yorke performed at an all-night vigil for the Trade Justice Movement. In 2006, Jonny Greenwood and Yorke performed a special benefit concert for Friends of the Earth. Yorke made headlines the same year for refusing Prime Minister Tony Blair's request to meet with him to discuss climate change, declaring Blair had "no environmental credentials". Yorke has subsequently been critical of his own energy use. He has said the music industry's use of air transport is dangerous and unsustainable, and that he would consider not touring if new carbon emissions standards do not force the situation to improve. Radiohead commissioned a study by the group Best Foot Forward which the band claims helped them choose venues and transport methods that will greatly reduce the carbon expended on their 2008 tour. The band also made use of a new low-energy LED lighting system and encouraged festivals to offer reusable plastics.

Thom Yorke supported the climate change documentary, The Age of Stupid. He donated Radiohead's song "Reckoner" for the end credits of the film and performed the track live via satellite linkup for The Age of Stupid's Global Premiere. During the live satellite linkup, Yorke spoke out about the problems of economic growth, saying, "I think Ed Miliband probably knows this but won't admit it, as most politicians won't: that the concept of limitless economic growth is now dead."

In December 2009, Yorke gained access to the COP 15 climate change talks in Copenhagen, posing as a member of the media. Whilst at the conference he took part in Spanner Films 'Stupid Show' - short films shot at the conference each day with the aim of making the talks comprehensible for ordinary people. He appeared alongside Tony Juniper, debating the barriers to a global deal on emissions reduction and the issue of media representation of the climate change debate - he called the BBC a "bunch of monkeys"

Relationship with celebrities and the media

Yorke has had an uneasy relationship with other celebrities and the media. Following Radiohead's 1993 Pablo Honey tour of America, Yorke became disenchanted at being "right at the sharp end of the sexy, sassy, MTV eye-candy lifestyle" he felt he was helping to sell to the world. The 1998 documentary film Meeting People is Easy portrays Yorke's disaffection with the music industry and press during the 1997-8 "Against Demons" world tour.

A number of celebrities have been upset by Yorke's public persona. In 2001, Kelly Jones, the lead singer of the Welsh band Stereophonics, referred to Thom Yorke as a "miserable twat" (a comment he later retracted). In 2002, Jack Black claimed to have approached Yorke to congratulate him on his solo show at the Bridge School Benefit concert in San Francisco, only for Yorke to ignore him and walk away. Referring to the incident, Black stated in an interview: "I heard later that he's famously cold, and it wasn't just me that he despises, but the whole world." After completing a trek of Kilimanjaro in 2009, Ronan Keating was asked by an interviewer which celebrity he would most like to throw off a mountain. Keating named Yorke, and referred to him as a "muppet", stating that Yorke was once rude to him. In the same year, Miley Cyrus and Kanye West also complained about Yorke's alleged rudeness. In a response to these complaints, Yorke wrote on Radiohead's Dead Air Space website, "wish us all a safe journey if you still like us and you're not one of those people I have managed to offend by doing nothing."

Discography

Notes

References

External links

The Eraser: Official website for Yorke's solo album release

Category:Article Feedback Pilot Category:1968 births Category:English activists Category:English environmentalists Category:Anti-globalization activists Category:English male singers Category:English rock singers Category:English singer-songwriters Category:English tenors Category:English vegans Category:Friends of the Earth Category:Grammy Award winners Category:Ivor Novello Award winners Category:Living people Category:People from Wellingborough Category:Radiohead members Category:Alumni of the University of Exeter Category:Music from Oxford Category:Old Abingdonians Category:Rhythm guitarists Category:XL Recordings artists

af:Thom Yorke bg:Том Йорк ca:Thom Yorke cs:Thom Yorke co:Thom Yorke da:Thom Yorke de:Thom Yorke et:Thom Yorke es:Thom Yorke fa:تام یورک fr:Thom Yorke gl:Thom Yorke ko:톰 요크 it:Thom Yorke he:תום יורק ka:ტომ იორკი lt:Thom Yorke mk:Том Јорк nl:Thom Yorke ja:トム・ヨーク no:Thom Yorke uz:Thom Yorke pl:Thom Yorke pt:Thom Yorke ro:Thom Yorke ru:Йорк, Том simple:Thom Yorke sk:Thom Yorke sr:Tom Jork fi:Thom Yorke sv:Thom Yorke tr:Thom Yorke uk:Том Йорк zh:湯姆·約克