Brooklyn band TV on the Radio have been critical favourites since they first appeared almost a decade ago. Always an intriguing proposition, they also seemed from their inception to be shrewdly aware of their musical Catholicism, as if they'd followed Brian Eno's Oblique Strategies before they'd even had their first jam. Brilliant, then, but tinged with Wire-friendly cerebralism.
Their last album, Dear Science, followed this pattern and was among the best, most intriguing releases of 2008. Nine Types of Light, however, is a whole new glorious ball game. Where previous outings were recorded in New York, it was made in Los Angeles and the sunshine has bled into the grooves. It sounds like a band relaxing, having immense fun and consequently making fabulous unself-conscious pop music
They set the bar stupidly high with the opening "Second Song", a preposterously brilliant confection that amalgamates pop essence from David Byrne, Roxy Music, Screamadelica and the Scissor Sisters. Yes, that delicious. They then live up to it with another nine tracks jammed with as many ideas as ever but revelling in an unadulterated joy and emotion that was previously absent. "Keep Your Heart" is Bowie's "China Girl" if it had been written by Japan; "No Future Shock" sounds as if it's intended to be a dance craze in the vein of, say, the Mashed Potato, but for post-punkers; "Killer Crane" is blissed-out psychedelia, redolent of George Harrison's stoned Beatles number "Blue Jay Way"; "New Cannonball Blues" raunches into heavy-duty sleaze-funk and as for "Forgotten", it's just epic - it even has whistling. Every song's a stormer. Nine Types of Light feels like one of those very rare albums that not only covers all bases artistically but also has the popular touch. I hope so because it would be wonderful to hear these blasting out of stereos all summer.
Find Watch the video for "Will Do"
Add comment