When TV on the Radio took the stage for their first Los Angeles show at the famed Silverlake Lounge, it was possibly the first time anyone saw four black guys and one medium-sized white guitarist take the stage in an indie rock venue. From über-hipsters to the editor-in-chief of Urb, the place was packed and throbbing. It was one of the shows you talk to your friends about later, after the band has blown up, you can say you were there and you felt the heat.
So, let's approach the obvious. TV on the Radio do not look like or sound like what is currently stereotyped as "indie." They have, quite ingeniously, created a hybrid sound that is hard to define. When asked about the fact that they are somewhat of an anomaly in indie rock (which is currently on the fast track to becoming as dreaded a term as "alternative" now is) vocalist Tunde Adebimpe had this to say,
"It's such a weird thing... that indie rock, like punk, started out as an expression of individuality."
"That's the nature of music," guitarist Kyp Malone interjects, "it gets commercialized. People think, 'This is what sells. This is what will get me to a particular place.'"
I comment that such current ideologies in indie music are exactly why seminal bands like Slint never had platinum albums.
"But there wouldn't be a Sigur Ros without a Slint." Kyp digresses.
Guitarist David Sitek agrees and adds, "Time will tell the irrelevance or relevance of whatever is going on now. To identify it now and call it out doesn't matter."
Figuratively and literally speaking, TV on the Radio possess a lot of soul. They are remarkable not because they're more interesting but because they're less pretentious. On stage, Adebimpe is an electric octopus letting every note resonate from his feet up to his arms. Their songs somehow strip away the pseudo-coolness of a room and invite the listener to just stand there and feel. Sitek is equally compelling and explains how their lack of pretense is their commitment to being themselves,
"I will allow for some people to think they're the shit and talk like they're the shit. David Bowie knows he's the shit, but he has the right to. People who are emulating Bowie don't have the right to act like that. I've seen fifteen Joy Divisions without the pain in the past five years and it drives me crazy. If someone really wants to demo their mental illness it's not necessary to have all that equipment around or for me to pay to see it. If you're going to see it, it has to be real. I really want to see someone in pain, I'm not telling anyone to cut their faces off or fuck themselves up like G.G. Allen. It's just really weird to get on stage and put that on and then twenty minutes later hit on your publicist."
Can I get an Amen?
