Saturday night’s TV on the Radio showed a band motivated by their personal ambition and the political climate in which they’re working. Like the early days of U2, R.E.M. and more recent Radiohead albums, TV on the Radio combine politics and love and confusion without overpowering the audiences with melodrama or messiah complexes. Tunde Adebimpe fronts the band like a man possessed, borrowing liberally from Michael Stipe’s histrionic stage presence, often flailing as he sings. Lead guitarist Kyp Malone snarls menacingly at his side, providing the beautiful, dangerous harmonies that make TV on the Radio’s trademark sound so singularly gorgeous and urgent.
The energy and excitement they generate doesn’t come without sacrifices. The deft separation that defines the sound of Return to Cookie Mountain literally gets lost in the mix, resulting in a more uniform fuzztone undercurrent that enveloped Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes. But maybe that’s partly the point. For all the studio artistry in evidence on their new album, their rabid live performances are what win over fans in the end. In sum, TV on the Radio embody many of the qualities that were once understood, perhaps too simply in a now extinct format, as modern rock.
