The group has released several EPs including their debut Young Liars (2003), and five studio albums: Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes (2004), Return to Cookie Mountain (2006), Dear Science (2008), Nine Types of Light (2011), and Seeds (2014).
For most of the band's existence, the core TV on the Radio lineup has been Tunde Adebimpe (vocals/loops), David Andrew Sitek (guitars/keyboards/loops), Kyp Malone (vocals/guitars/bass/loops), Jaleel Bunton (drums/vocals/loops/guitars) and Gerard Smith (bass/keyboards) as official members.
The band's Bio from their website:
TV on the Radio gets to do anything. Like a small platoon whose pleasing impenetrability is their core, the band consistently confounds expectations while managing to balance respect from critics and peers alike. The result is TV on the Radio gets to do anything they want. This freedom is their engine.
“It’s about doing what feels right,” says singer Tunde Adebimpe. “I really feel like this band is something that is expansive and always changing and growing. If we wear our influences on our sleeve, it’s a pretty crowded sleeve.”
It’s no different with Seeds, the new and fifth proper studio album that Adebimpe has made along with Jaleel Bunton, Kyp Malone, and David Andrew Sitek (who also produced it). Having long outlasted that early 2000s fascination with all things Brooklyn to which the hip willfully succumbed, they continue to conquer music on their own terms. This album serves as another step in continuing to heed their reputation as “the most vital, current band in America” (Associated Press).
This go-round the songs are immediate and triumphant, textured with storytelling hooks and possibly the most honest music this band has ever composed. They’ve hit a point where they’re OK being straight-up beautiful without having to manipulate prettiness into whatever unforeseen shape.
Slate says Seeds has “TV on the Radio’s best songs in years. They are sounding sharper than ever.” And the band knows it. Adebimpe has already said this is the band’s best record. Not a boast, just an observation.
“I feel like I knew it before we were done,” he says immediately. “I was so excited by the songs while we were making them, I wanted to get more and more and more into it. The general feeling going into it was, 'We're still here. Our friendship with each other is so strong. Being in a band, at its best times, is like being... well, let’s say whenever things are going really well, we're like ‘cool, Voltron's back together.’“
The TV on the Radio guys are the type of people who go on hiatus and focus on music. They may take time between albums for their other endeavors, but they know when it’s right to come together – especially when the music comes as easily and passionately as it did with case Seeds. The band found themselves collected in David Sitek’s Los Angeles studio last year and recorded a couple of songs – “Mercy” and “Million Miles” and didn’t want to stop.
“Those were just songs that we wrote because we hadn't written songs together in a while,” says Sitek “They came out really fast and inspired us to do it again – and then ‘again’ turned into the record.”
Adebimpe and Sitek live in Los Angeles, Bunton and Malone reside in New York, but make no mistake: TV on the Radio is a quartet. To attempt to parse out exactly what each member does in the group would be to dismantle the fundamental essence of what makes TV on the Radio the monolithic anomaly they have been careful to cultivate and protect for more than a decade. They permeate beyond a wall of sound, and instead create a planetarium of music with every song. They embody many voices. Most of them can play just about anything. And sing too. They are equal partners in the creation of a type of noise that appeared seemingly out of nowhere over 10 years ago.
Throughout the years, TV on the Radio has been consistent in the standard they set for themselves. Earlier records, Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes and Return To Cookie Mountain stole the hearts of fans and critics alike just the same, winning the Shortlist Music Prize and Spin's Album of the Year respectively. Their breakout release Dear Science was named best album of 2008 by Rolling Stone, The Guardian, Spin Magazine, The New York Times, The Onion AV Club, MTV, even Entertainment Weekly. An embarrassment of riches, really. Their last album, 2011's Nine Types of Light, was deemed "pure heaven" by the cherubs at Rolling Stone, and earned the band a Grammy® nomination. The band has also graced the stages of Saturday Night Live and The Colbert Report.
“The band is it’s own ‘self.’ It has to be that way,” Adebimpe says. “That's been the goal for a long time. Nobody really wants to be the focal point for the band; the band should be the focal point. Not even the band: the music. We can show up and take credit for it, but ultimately it's something that maybe we helped shape and facilitate coming into the world. But that’s all.”
They happily recruit likeminded associates to help prop up this invention of theirs in the studio and on stage. (Kelis, for instance, appears on “Lazzeray”). The band has recorded and performed with other artists who’ve conquered the music world on their own terms just as much as they have. Fellow mavericks like Trent Reznor, Nick Zinner of Yeah Yeah Yeahs fame, Bauhaus singer Peter Murphy, Kazu Makino of Blonde Redhead, Martin Perna of Antibalas, Katrina Ford of Celebration, and David chuffing Bowie have all romped in the sandbox with TV on the Radio.
“If you share a material thing, it dissipates,” Adebimpe says, recalling a fragment of philosophy he once heard, or might be improvising on the spot. “If you share a spiritual thing, it just increases. It becomes more and more and more. I'm already thinking about the next record.”
Seeds is an expression of everything this band has been through in the last three years and more. They’re influential, in their prime, they’re TV on the Radio, and they’ve proven themselves to be one of the most important bands of this generation. It clicks, as it always does, and TV on the Radio is brand new again, again.
“No matter what you go through individually and collectively, when you step away from each other, you're kind of like, "I know that if we get together we can fire this thing," says Adebimpe. “It's definitely in the spirit of the punk rock we all grew up with. If you win, you're still a punk. If you lose, you're still a punk, and honestly, it's not about anybody else.”
http://www.tvontheradio.com/
Wash the Day Away
TV on the Radio Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
High above in limbless tree
Echoes from their tiny box
Ring out into the atmosphere
Creating beauty inadvertently
It was a technological feat
This little bird
Wading through the market's waste
We locked eyes felt our loneliness abate
True desire showed its face, but only momentarily
Grey cascades in foreign waves
Wash the day away
I bought you flowers from the dying woods of Brazil
This little bird
While the kids burned down the greenhouse pushed the charred frame into the landfill
Put his beak to the word
We bought new bodies we bought diamond encrusted guns
So who the hell are you?
Making out so high in the backseat of a car-bomb under carcinogenic sun
Grey cascades in foreign waves
Wash the day away
Grey cascades in foreign waves
We did believe in magic we did believe
We let our souls act as canaries
Our hearts gilded cages be
Watched a million dimming lanterns float out to sea
Lay your malady at the mouth of the death machine
Aeroplane odabo
Ba mi ki won lo odabo
Eko meji, o yo mi
O yo mi
O yo mi
Grey cascades in foreign waves
Wash the day away
Grey cascades in foreign waves
Wash the day away
The first verse of "Wash the Day Away" by TV on the Radio is a commentary on the ways in which technology and our use of it can have unintended consequences. The "little flightless metal birds" refer to cell phones, which are often equated to tiny machines that have the power to connect us to people thousands of miles away. The "limbless tree" that they are "high above" might be a metaphor for our globalized world, in which we are all connected but also feel disconnected from each other at times. The "echoes from their tiny box" are the sounds of our text messages, phone calls, and other digital communications that reverberate through the atmosphere. While the technology itself might not be beautiful, its unintended effects can create beauty, as people connect and share their experiences.
The second verse takes a more introspective turn, as the singer reflects on their own experience of loneliness and desire. The "market's waste" might speak to the feeling of being lost or forgotten in a crowded place, while "locking eyes" with someone else can create a momentary sense of connection. The lyrics then shift to more ominous imagery, with "grey cascades in foreign waves" representing a kind of cleansing or purification. The purchase of flowers from a dying forest in Brazil and the burning of a greenhouse suggest a disregard for the natural world and a willingness to engage in destructive behavior. The line "put his beak to the word" could imply that the singer is speaking out against this behavior, but it's unclear who or what they are addressing.
Line by Line Meaning
Little flightless metal birds
Referring to airplanes as little bird-like machines
High above in limbless tree
Planes flying through the air, resembling birds in a treeless expanse of sky
Echoes from their tiny box
The music and voices from a radio onboard the airplane
Ring out into the atmosphere
The sound from the radio waves spreading out into the air
Creating beauty inadvertently
The beauty of the ambient sounds and music creating a peaceful atmosphere on the plane
It was a technological feat
The amazing feat of technology that is air travel
Wading through the market's waste
The singer is walking through a busy marketplace, possibly in a developing country
We locked eyes felt our loneliness abate
The artist made eye contact with someone in the market, feeling a sense of connection and loneliness dissipating
True desire showed its face, but only momentarily
Despite the connection, any romantic or personal desires were fleeting and short-lived
Grey cascades in foreign waves
Rain falling in a foreign land
Wash the day away
The rain physically cleansing the environment and possibly the singer's emotional state
I bought you flowers from the dying woods of Brazil
A romantic gesture from the artist to their love-interest, possibly reflecting environmental themes and the destruction of natural resources
While the kids burned down the greenhouse pushed the charred frame into the landfill
A juxtaposition of romance and destruction - while the singer is showing love through flowers, others are burning down a greenhouse
Put his beak to the word
Referring to the little metal bird (airplane) again, and how it symbolizes communication and spreading of ideas
We bought new bodies we bought diamond encrusted guns
An indulgence in consumerism and superficiality, rather than caring for the environment or social issues
So who the hell are you?
A rhetorical question about identity and self-reflection
Making out so high in the backseat of a car-bomb under carcinogenic sun
The dangerous and volatile nature of the artists' actions and the environment in which they are carried out
We did believe in magic we did believe
A nostalgic and wistful reflection on simpler times when the characters had more faith and positivity
We let our souls act as canaries
A metaphor of the soul being like a canary in a coal mine - a warning signal when danger is present
Our hearts gilded cages be
Despite their positive beliefs and hopeful natures, the artist feels trapped and confined in societal expectations and restrictions
Watched a million dimming lanterns float out to sea
A metaphor for the fleeting nature of life and beauty
Lay your malady at the mouth of the death machine
A call to action against societal and environmental destruction
Aeroplane odabo
The refrain from the beginning of the song, bringing the themes of technology and travel back to the forefront
Ba mi ki won lo odabo
A Nigerian phrase possibly meaning 'don't leave me behind'
Eko meji, o yo mi
Yoruba words for 'two Lagos, pity me'
O yo mi
Possible variation of the phrase 'Ojo mi' which means 'my day'
Grey cascades in foreign waves
Bringing attention back to the rain and the environmental themes of the song
Wash the day away
Ending the song with the cleansing and refreshing effects of rainfall
Contributed by David H. Suggest a correction in the comments below.