Pitchfork

We've got to hand it to the University of Arizona's "Pride of Arizona" marching band director Jay Rees for his taste in tunes. In the past, he's put together shows around material from the Talking Heads, the Smashing Pumpkins, the Beatles, and more, apparently.

For the 2006 season, Rees brought the music of Radiohead to the Tucson community, and several rehearsal videos made their way to YouTube. And then the links to those videos cruised over to our inboxes thanks to Pitchfork reader Max Traylor.

Our personal favorite piece of footage is culled from the middle of the band's performance. It begins with all 250+ students chanting "Fitter Happier", and from there kicks into a booming, brassy "Optimistic". This rolls straight into "The National Anthem", which features a couple of impressive, range-pushing trumpet solos.

"The National Anthem" runs into "Karma Police", which opens with the marching band singing, "This is what you get. This is what you get when you mess with us." Safe to say, it's pretty spectacular...and even more so when you factor in the perfectly aligned field formations accompanying the music. We can't make out whether or not those formations are actually shapes that have anything to do with Radiohead, but still, they're pretty fucking cool.

Best of all, the majestic ending that follows "Karma Police" only wraps up the second third of the full Radiohead show. Parts one and three are linked below.