Wolf at the Door

"Wolf at the Door"
Song

This article is about a song by Radiohead. For a song with a similar title by Keane, see Wolf at the Door.

A Wolf at the Door. (It Girl. Rag Doll.) is a song by the English rock band Radiohead. It is subtitled "It Girl. Rag Doll." on their 2003 album Hail to the Thief.

It was previously worked on during the Kid A/Amnesiac sessions (1999–2000) when it was known as "Keep the Wolf from the Door", according to a studio diary kept by guitarist Ed O'Brien. The song was debuted live in 2002 on a tour of Portugal and Spain.

The lyrics were written by Thom Yorke, who was on a train filled with obnoxious drunk rich boys, which is shown in the line "City boys in first class... someone else is gonna come and clean it up." The line "don't know they're born" parallels comments Yorke made in a 1997 interview about his home town of Oxford: "most of those historic, beautiful buildings are surrounded by barbed wire and spiked walls... seeing these fuckers [students] walking around in their ball gowns, throwing up on the streets, being obnoxious to the population. The little guys in the bowler hats will clear up their puke and make their beds for them every night. They don't know they're born and they're going to run the country. It's scary. Of all the towns in the country it's one of the most obvious examples of a class divide."

The line "flan in the face" is a reference to Clare Short, the U.K. overseas aid/development secretary who was once assaulted with a custard pie by anti-globalization activists and who later resigned from Tony Blair's cabinet over the Iraq War. The "wolf" title and reference to Three Little Pigs has been seen as one of many fairy tale metaphors on the album, inspired by his status as a new father. Apparently Yorke felt the lyrics were too bleak to use, until Jonny came up with the jaunty, angular backing music.

"A Wolf at the Door" has been noted for its minor key arpeggiated guitar line reminiscent of the Beatles' "Because" and "I Want You (She's So Heavy)", both found on Abbey Road (both of these songs in turn were based on Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata). The opening notes of the song also recall the Radiohead b-side "You Never Wash Up After Yourself".

"Wolf at the Door" is one of the few Radiohead songs written in 6/8 time. With its half-rapped delivery of stream-of-consciousness lyrics, the song is also unique among Radiohead's work, bearing more of a resemblance to Bob Dylan's "Subterranean Homesick Blues". However, some have found the jerky backing seems to date back stylistically to On a Friday, the name Radiohead went by in their earliest days, in particular to the 'dance crossover' tracks such as "Rattlesnake" which Thom would compose with his drum machine and tape loops.