''Seeds'' is the fifth studio album by American

art rock Art rock is a subgenre of rock music that generally reflects a challenging or avant-garde approach to rock, or which makes use of modernist, experimental, or unconventional elements. Art rock aspires to elevate rock from entertainment to an art ...

band

TV on the Radio TV on the Radio (TVOTR) is an American rock band from Brooklyn, New York, formed in 2001. The band consists of Tunde Adebimpe (vocals, loops), David Andrew Sitek (guitars, keyboards, loops), Kyp Malone (vocals, guitars, bass, loops), and Jale ...

, released on November 18, 2014 through

Harvest Records Harvest Records is a British-American record label belonging to Capitol Music Group, originally created by EMI in 1969. History Harvest Records was created by EMI in 1969 to market progressive rock music, and to compete with Philips' Vertigo ...

. It is the band's first album since the 2011 death of their bassist, Gerard Smith. The album's first single, "

Happy Idiot "Happy Idiot" is the first single from American indie rock band TV on the Radio's fifth studio album ''Seeds''. Background TV on the Radio's lead singer Tunde Adebimpe clarified to Music Feeds that Happy Idiot's lyrics were about distancing from t ...

", was released on September 2, 2014.

Recording

''Seeds'' was recorded in

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

, at guitarist Dave Sitek's Federal Prism home studio. Sitek also produced the record. Lead singer

Tunde Adebimpe Babatunde Omoroga Adebimpe (born February 26, 1975) is an American musician, singer-songwriter, actor, director, and visual artist best known as the lead singer of the Brooklyn-based band TV on the Radio. Early life Adebimpe was born into a Nige ...

explained, "It was nice to be somewhere where you're not exactly on the clock and worried about how much everything is costing you. It was pretty much the same situation as when we started making music."

Release

The band announced the album on July 29, 2014. Adebimpe stated in a press release:

Reception

''Seeds'' was positively received by most critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 78, based on 30 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Many reviewers commented on the album's shift in aesthetic from the band's past work, attributing it to the passing of long-time band member Gerard Smith. Heather Phares of

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databas ...

wrote that "''Seeds'' has a palpable sense of moving on for TV on the Radio ..with the band confronting loss directly on the album's first half and accepting it on the second." She found the album to be "a fine tribute to Smith and the sound of enduring unimaginable loss." Mark Beaumont of ''

NME ''New Musical Express'' (''NME'') is a British music, film, gaming, and culture website and brand. Founded as a newspaper in 1952, with the publication being referred to as a 'rock inkie', the NME would become a magazine that ended up as a f ...

'' observed that "grief and anger are channelled into a propulsive energy, driving the quartet's synthetic pop explorations with added garage-rock urgency" and ultimately concluding that the band "have returned from an uncertain period sounding remarkably fresh." Ian Gormely of ''

Exclaim! ''Exclaim!'' is a Canadian music and entertainment publisher based in Toronto, which features in-depth coverage of new music across all genres with a special focus on Canadian and emerging artists. The monthly Exclaim! print magazine publishes 7 ...

'' described it as a "sublime catharsis after the group's tragic loss and a perfect distillation of what the band do best".

Track listing

Charts

References

{{Authority control 2014 albums Albums produced by Dave Sitek TV on the Radio albums Harvest Records albums