Radiohead recorded most of the songs on My Iron Lung at RAK Studios, London, during the sessions for their second album, The Bends (1995).

[6] The songwriter, Thom Yorke, said the EP was "just for fans", and described it as a collection of songs that did not fit the album rather than outtakes: "We think they're good, otherwise we wouldn't have plugged them on.

Donwood was not a fan of rock music, and said he took the work because he knew Yorke from their time as art students at the University of Exeter.

"[13] According to the journalist Mac Randall, "My Iron Lung" transitions from a "jangly" opening hook to a "McCartney-esque verse melody" and "pulverising guitar explosions" in the bridge.

[6] Jonny Greenwood used a DigiTech Whammy pedal to pitch-shift his guitar by one octave, creating a "glitchy, lo-fi" sound.

[16] The A&R vice president, Perry Watts-Russel, said Capitol had not pursued radio play as "My Iron Lung" was intended for fans rather than as the lead single for The Bends.

[23] Randall noted that, unlike the UK, the US was not a major market for singles, and that the sales instead indicated that Radiohead had built an audience in America.

[17] "My Iron Lung" initially received mixed reviews, with critics likening its verse-chorus dynamic to the 1993 Nirvana song "Heart-Shaped Box".

[25] The AllMusic critic Greg Prato praised the EP, writing: "Because of the tracks' consistency and sequencing, it plays like a real album rather than a collection of B-sides and outtakes thrown together haphazardly."

"[24] The Pitchfork critic Scott Plagenhoef wrote that My Iron Lung had Radiohead finding "new ways to pick apart and re-construct the typical alt-rock template" and "demonstrated a band whose collective heads seemed to crack open and spill out new ideas".

[27] In 2020, the Guardian named "My Iron Lung" the 10th-best Radiohead song, writing that it "uses catchy hooks and brawny riffs to rally against commercialisation.