TV On The Radio are heading to Australia for a string of shows (both festivals and clubs). They’re touring on the back of a terrific new record Seeds. Sean Sennett caught up with KYP MALONE before the band set sail from Brooklyn to our shores.
TOM: When you’re playing live these days does the band tend to be focused on the new record or do you play a cross section of material?
Kyp: It’s a cross section but it’s new-record heavy, for sure. It’s recent, we’re proud of it, and it’s more exciting to be playing. That’s half the challenge – getting your head around new material.
Do you like playing festivals and play a concise set – or do you prefer to push it out a bit more in your club shows?
Kyp: Club shows, but festivals have their own potential for magic. The space that we occupy… it’s a very rare show that we have that’s going to have the amount of people as a festival. People go to whatever’s on the stage often, whether they know it or not at the festival. There’s nothing like that energy, having that many people checking out what you’re doing. But the intimacy of the club is where we are the most ourselves as a band.
I really love (new single) “Laser Ray.” How did that song come about?
Kyp: You’d have to ask Adebimpe. At the beginning of the process of recording this record, it was the first song that got laid down. Everyone kind of knew no matter what, that song would be on the record.
I think it hearkened back to something we were doing live over the course of years, and I’m glad it’s on there. The record is not necessarily an obvious reflection of older stuff, even though clearly (it’s) the same band. But that song kind of ties the record to the old material.
The stuff on the record sounds very immediate. Was it recorded quickly?
Kyp: Yeah. Stuff gets recorded quickly and we had a lot of time to listen to the music, and sand this down, or bump that up. Mostly yeah, a lot of stuff came together quickly on this record.
In terms of living on opposite sides of the country (LA and NYC), it must be good creatively to have down time from seeing each other all the time.
Kyp: That’s always been the case, whether we were in the same town or not. The majority of the time we spend together is when we’re working on a record or touring. The neighbourhood is small but it’s not that small. You can hide if you want to hide. But yeah, it’s definitely good to be able to get your own life and your own world going after being on a bus or hold up in a studio.
You have a lot of side projects going on. What’s occupying you at the moment, outside of TV on the Radio?
Kyp: I just got back from working on an art show with an art collective I’m a member of. We have a show in Rotterdam. I’m going up in a week and a half. It’s exciting to get to spend a month working on something more than music, creating stuff that wasn’t music. It’s sculptural installation and some wall art too. I think officially it’s called HOWDOYOUSAYYAMINAFRICAN, but I refer to it as the Yam Collective.
Do you incorporate sound into that as well or keep it strictly visual?
Kyp: There’s a lot of sound. The first thing I participated with them in was a feature-length film that was in the Whitney Biennial last year. It was kind of a musical of sorts. Don Lundy wrote the libretto and then we just took that, and me and a bunch of other musicians put different pieces from different scenes, and laid down tracks and vocals using the poetry as the lyrics. There’s definitely a musical aspect to it but we mostly have worked on the music for this upcoming installation earlier in the winter, at Deer Creek Studio in Washington State.
With TV on the Radio, when you rehearse these days, do you like to finesse things to the nth degree or is there a lot of room for movement in there?
Kyp: I personally really like the fact that we have a recorded version of a song that takes away any frightening ambiguity as far as how the song is supposed to sound. You have that as a base, and then it’s really great to be able to go from there and take it in different directions.
I feel like it’s easier with older material: to be able to take it into different directions. I feel like probably getting closer to adding improvisatory aspects to the material but it’s still pretty much like we’re playing it like the record now. I’m really looking forward to getting freer. That’s where it’s at for me].
When you finish a record, is that it or is it always seeds of a next record is with you already?
Kyp: I don’t know. I guess maybe there was a time when I was thinking about the next record, but this is the project that has the most architecture around it, and it’s kind of the one that has the most people with expectations around it. It takes longer for things to happen, and longer for us to want to get back together and do the work on making a record. I don’t sweat it at all. I’m never calling anyone saying it’s time to make another record. I just try to stay as busy and productive with other things I have in the meantime.
Going back to 2006, how did David Bowie come to work with you guys?
Kyp: I can’t remember exactly. I think I had a hairdresser friend playing our CD or something at a shoot, and he heard it and asked about it. I think that’s the initial thing that happened, if I remember correctly. And then he reached out. We played different songs we had that we were working on for the record, and we said tell us where you hear yourself, and we ended up working on “Province” which is a super-giant memory I’ll never forget, and always feel greatly honoured and privileged that he worked on that song.
Any Rain Machine stuff coming next?
Kyp: Yeah, I’ve been writing and recording. I’m excited to make another Rain Machine record. I’ve just been working on other peoples’ records and some soundtrack stuff. But I am getting antsy to make another one. It’s been a long time.
Tour Dates
Monday, 8th June
Sydney Opera House, Sydney
Tickets: Vivid Live
Wednesday, 10th June
The Tivoli, Brisbane
Tickets: Live Nation
Friday, 12th June
The Forum, Melbourne
Tickets: Live Nation
Saturday, 13th June – NEW SHOW
The Forum, Melbourne
Tickets: Live Nation
