TV on the Radio: Return to Cookie Mountain

By Olivia Desianti

The Brooklyn based group, TV on the Radio, created a serious re-invention to indie rock with their debut Desperate Youth Blood Thirsty Babes. And now, they’re back with Return to Cookie Mountain, which is an evolution of what they'd done before—the art-rock sound, the grimy electro and the rough edges that don't need polishing. To sum things up, the album is an even more atmospheric album.

It starts off with the year's best intro – drum beats, clashes, and an offbeat horn symphony that cuts itself off, before repeating again. As the jagged electronic beats come on, Tunde Adepimbe begins to croon, "I was a lover/before this war... I'm locked in my bedroom/so send back the clowns..." It's a bittersweet song with a warm, rich feeling. It is then followed by a beautiful song named “Province”. And yes, that IS David Bowie’s voice singing out the vocal harmonies.

The closest thing they have to typical rock is the heart-pounding "Wolf Like Me", with its howled bridges and eerie feeling, and the expansive, tinkling, explosive "Playhouses." There's also the rustling, stomping art-rock of "Let the Devil In", the swirling electro-rock, the soul-rock, and the epic bass-rock of the finale "Wash the Day Away".

The atmosphere is carefully crafted in this album. That atmosphere is from a dangerous, beautiful place—campfires, tribal dances, wild animals and flying over mountains. The repetitive drums, bass and more typical instruments are loaded down with flutes, samples, electronic beats, mellotron and cymbals. It's all tangled in to create a hypnotic melody.

The most hypnotic instrument is the vocals. Adepimbe can be deep and soulful, force desperate howls, or higher and soaring; either way, he hasn't got the typical disinterested rock voice. The jumbled, colorful lyrics are hard to make out at times, and eventually they become another repetitive pattern in the music.

TV on the Radio pushed themselves even further with Return to Cookie Mountain, and yet there's a feeling of unfulfilled promise...hinting that they'll get even better as time goes on.