TV On The Radio Dress To Impress

I'm the first to admit that TV On The Radio come off on paper as extremely pretentious art rockers. Just look at the band in the pages of the October issue of Chart. In addition to looking like models from East Village Hipster Monthly, lead singer Tunde Adebimpe's face is covered in a bandana. I'm pretty sure Brooklyn isn't under attack right now. But Return To Cookie Mountain, the band's second full-length, is among the best records of the year, and their Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes debut was more self-assured than any band's first album has the right to be. The only real question mark was whether they could translate their lush beats and basslines into a show that would capture an audience's attention.

Things didn't look promising until the show's second song, a slightly reworked version of Desperate Youth's "Dreams." It was then that Kip Malone and David Sitek's guitars exploded from the speakers, while Adebimpe took off his glasses and really began to sweat. Adebimpe was a fitting focal point for the set. His energy was infectious and the crowd, which had been moderately sedated by Grizzly Bear's opening set, got more excited with every song.

Cookie Mountain tracks filled the set list, which suited everyone since it's the record that made the band bona fide contenders. It might be the most non-commercial LP ever to come out on Interscope. But its tracks are getting mainstream exposure on the TV shows Grey's Anatomy and Friday Night Lights, which could lead to TVOTR being the most unconventional success of this decade.

"I Was A Lover" rattled the floor with its bass samples, and Adebimpe looped some impressive beat-boxing to create the foundation for "Dirty Whirl." The highlight of the new work was "Wolf Like Me," one of the single best tracks of the year. The packed Opera House crowd threw their hands in the air for much of the song, and swayed hypnotically during the breakdown in the middle. If you were deaf, you might have confused the movement with the kind you'd see from the kids at a Limp Bizkit show (you know, when some people actually liked Limp Bizkit. It happened, I swear).

The inclusion of "Young Liars" mid-set was an excellent choice. It was surprising how few people seemed to know it, but by the end, they were all cheering wildly for the superb track from TVOTR's debut EP. "Staring At The Sun" was the song everyone was waiting for, and it was appropriately the centrepiece of the encore. Drummer Jaleel Bunton drove the live version of the Desperate Youths single, which features minimal percussion in its recorded form, and Adebimpe fully let loose, running franticly from one side of the stage to the other throughout. A singalong with Grizzly Bear on "Let The Devil In" could hardly top that performance, but fans happily waited out the finale anyway.

There are bands who you see at certain venues and know you'll never see them in a place that small again. This is the case with TVOTR, but I don't care — the more people exposed to their unique brand of vocal interplay, instrumental superiority and songwriting savvy, the better.