Tunde Adebimpe Presents: Higgins Waterproof Black Magic Band - "The Blast, The Boom" (ZNA Records)

While his primary band is taking what at least seems to be an honest, yet semi-active, indefinite hiatus, TV on The Radio frontman Tunde Adebimpe has crafted a new mouth-full of a band, Higgins Waterproof Black Magic Band. Here, Adebimpe is joined by 3 equally busy long-time friends: Ryan Sawyer, Josh Werner, and Alex Holden... members of Lone Wolf and Cub, Lee "Scratch" Perry/CocoRosie, and Big Numbers (respectively). Higgins Waterproof have recently announced a 5-track self-titled EP that's set for an October 1st release on their own imprint, ZNA Records, along with a month-long (October) Sunday night residency at Brooklyn's own Union Pool venue. I think it's pretty safe to assume that this is in fact the same 5-song collection Tunde Adebimpe was describing to SPIN just a few months ago: "You have friends in bands and you realize you've known each other 15 years and never played together, maybe out of respect for your friendship. We started doing mostly improvised shows but you do that a few times and songs start coming out of it. It started off pretty noisy and there's still a little bit of that element. It gets tripped out in places. If you like Can or This Heat, you'll probably be into it."


[Baba]unde Adebimpe actually performed 3 shows at Union Pool with Ryan Sawyer back in 2009 under the group name "Stabbing Eastward," right around the same time he released a widely unknown solo DVD-single as Fake Male Voice. While I thoroughly enjoyed TV on The Radio's stellar debut album Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes (2004), I willingly chose to skip over their middle 2 albums and didn't get back into the band until their recent short film/album package, Nine Types of Light (2011). TV on The Radio have since parted ways with long-time label Interscope and the band's latest Federal Prism single, "Mercy" is their first release since re-forming after founding member and multi-instrumentalist Gerard Smith's untimely death... ironocally, not long after Nine Types of Light's world-wide release. What might at first seem like a sign of demise for TV on The Radio, after 12 long years together, actually sounds like quite the opposite; Spending time apart with with each member's various projects, from Jane's Addiction to Higgins Waterproof Black Magic Band, has actually made TVotR stronger as a whole, which I'm sure will likely manifest itself on their as-yet-unannounced forthcoming release(s).