Radiohead have posted a new song and video on their website days after vanishing from the internet.

Burn The Witch, which has also had more than 120,000 views so far on the rock heavyweights’ YouTube channel, combines impatient pulsing strings with a thumping bassline.

And its accompanying video is characteristically dark, consisting of a Trumpton-like stop-motion animation retelling of what appears to be The Wicker Man, which ends with a man being burned alive.

The video, according to the YouTube credits, was directed by Chris Hopewell, who worked with the band on 2003′s There There.

Radiohead on stage
Radiohead went for a full social media white-out ( Dan Krauss / AP/Press Association Images)

The band had deleted its website and tweets on May 1 and sent cryptic leaflets to fans through the post, prompting speculation about when and how the group will release a new album.

It restarted its online presence early on Tuesday morning sharing three animations on Instagram which have been liked by more than 50,000 people, before putting up the full song.

Fans speculated they could be linked to the new company the band registered in January, Dawn Chorus LLP.

Radiohead also established companies before the surprise releases of records In Rainbows in 2007 and their last studio album, The King Of Limbs, in 2011.

Some fans have recently shared images of cards they have received in the post emblazoned with the band’s bear logo and the words: “Sing the song of sixpence that goes Burn The Witch.”