TV ON THE RADIO

Twenty years ago, Brooklyn-based band TV On The Radio released their critically acclaimed debut album, Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes. In celebration, the band’s original label, Touch and Go Records, released an anniversary edition of the project with five bonus tracks, two of which are previously unreleased tracks.

Originally released on March 9, 2004, Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes was hailed as “an immaculate album about disappointment in all its forms: romantic, civic, psychological” by Rolling Stone and was included in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die. It features the single “Staring at the Sun” plus a wealth of other memorable tracks, including “Dreams” and “Poppy.”

Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes, is an album full of rich, bruising ideas about life, love and loss. Lyrically but especially sonically, Desperate Youth, captured the dystopian hum of post-9/11 America (a war in Iraq, a proto-right-wing political regime, a surveillance state threatening personal agency at home), putting a voice to the general unease young people felt at the time. Kyp shared vocal duties with Tunde, creating a unique vocal fingerprint that further distinguished them from their peers. Desperate Youth captured the attention of critics around the world, and won the prestigious (and now defunct) Shortlist Music Prize that year. What was first seeded as an experimental enterprise had now, in just a couple of years, blossomed into something beautiful, powerful and whole.

Looking back at the band’s career, it is significant to note that TV On The Radio willfully pushed against stereotypes – musically and otherwise – simply by existing. The notion of a mostly Black indie rock band was, at first, a novelty for critics. But their identity and how it translated to lived experience is exactly what drives them to make the music they do; and over time, what has become more clear, is how they have carried forward the legacy of influential groups like Bad Brains, Death and Funkadelic before them. Similarly, it cannot be understated just how much of an impact TV On The Radio have made on future generations of Black indie artists pursuing their own path.