By: Daniel Gerichter (@ZenDonut) –
TV on the Radio. (Photo: David McAndrew/Aesthetic Magazine Toronto)
On an unusually chilly June night, Brooklyn art-rockers TV on the Radio hit Toronto’s Luminato stage. Featuring a back catalogue that spans over 13 years, the band took the crowd through a short, but career spanning set that also included a few new cuts.
The band’s signature, key-heavy, harmonized sound was on full display, with songs like “Young Liars”, “Dreams” and “Golden Age” kicking things off. About four songs in, the band got cheeky, bantering with each other and the crowd. Singer Tunde Adebimpe and guitarist/epic beard curator Kyp Malone demanded more noise from the admittedly subdued, crowd (again, the weather may have had something to do with that). “I can’t hear you. No, I mean it. I literally can’t hear you.” (applause) “What?” Awesome.
And as the set rolled through, the band brought out their faster-paced, more bombastic songs like mega-single “Wolf like Me” and gave tunes like “Repetition” a lot of live punk feel. Around the three-quarter mark, Adebimpe announced that it was, in fact drummer Jaleel Bunton’s birthday, which launched the now frothy crowd into a delightfully tone-deaf rendition of “Happy Birthday.” Amused, Bunton obliged us with a perfectly placed rimshot.
The inexplicable crux of the show also happened to be its abrupt, seemingly too-early ending. While the Roots’ set, who performed on June 7th, started at the same time, this set ended in almost half that. One would think that with the tremendous amount of material the band has, they’d be able to fill well over an hour (set clocked in at about an 1:07). Worst of all, as soon as the pace kicked into high gear, the set was over. While it was great to experience this storied band live, you were left with the impression that there was a lot left out.
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TV on the Radio
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Saidah Baba Talibah
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