Radio Retaliation: An Interview with Thievery Corporation

December 3, 2008 3:47 PM
by Gillian Singletary

Since 1995, Rob Garza and Eric Hilton, of the Washington, DC based DJ duo Thievery Corporation, have flown under the commercial radar while still developing a devoted fan base among DJ enthusiasts and overseas. With their fourth album, Radio Retaliation, the duo takes on corporate behemoths like Clear Channel—hidden amongst their deceptively mellow beats is a message of discontent with the mega-radio empire. CoolJunkie had a change to speak to Thievery Corporation's Eric Hilton about media monopolies, Washington nightlife and the politics of sound.

CoolJunkie: Thievery Corporation released Radio Retaliation via iLike and Facebook. What was behind your decision behind that?

Eric Hilton: I don’t really know. They came to us with a joint promotion and it just seemed like a good way to get it out there. We didn’t do a lot of press for this album, so we wanted to make sure that people knew about it.

CJ: Was there a specific reason you didn’t do a lot of press?

Eric Hilton: Time. Just time. To do print press, you have to have the album 4 months before it comes out so that would have meant waiting until next year. It had been so long since we had put out an album, we just wanted to get it out.

CJ: Radio Retaliation is more specifically political than some of Thievery Corporation's other stuff…

Eric Hilton: That’s what people are saying. I don’t really think it’s any more political than anything else we’ve done.

CJ: Do you think that being located where you are out of DC influences how political your music is?

Eric Hilton: Well, politics certainly influences the culture of the city. DC, the people, are kind of isolated though. It’s its own bubble. DC is a place where people come to pursue something specific. They’re here because they want to be here. There are other bubbles. Like, L.A. is a bubble. New York used to be a bubble, but who knows anymore. There aren’t that many people that grow up here and stay here, for whatever reason but I’m one of them. I guess maybe if I were in Detroit, Michigan or somewhere else I might be more politically motivated.

CJ: What about the nightlife in DC…what are the kind of places you go. Obviously you probably spend a lot of time at the 18th St Lounge [that Hilton co-owns] but are there other places that you like to go, in the neighborhood?

Eric Hilton: I spend a lot of time at 18th Street Lounge – I’ve also opened Marvin's, a restaurant/lounge and I’m there probably 3 or 4 nights a week. Not just because I really enjoy it, but I’m kind of obligated to be there. Besides that, I like The Velvet Lounge. The 9:30 Club is a good venue, 1200 seats, that's nearby. All these places are in the neighborhood, Shaw. It’s nice because people can walk everywhere without having to get in a car and drive out somewhere. Shaw is becoming the new Brooklyn.

CJ: Has owning a lounge made it easier to make musical inroads into the scene?

Eric Hilton: Yeah, I think it gave a place to practice. We were able to have sets at the 18th Street Lounge where we could play demos, and it gave us a venue to experiment.

CJ: We heard that Radio Retaliation is Thievery Corporation's response to companies like Clear Channel taking over music interests.

Eric Hilton: It definitely is. There’s no freedom for artists here. We're not so political in terms of party politics. I mean, Rob and I both always vote for third party candidates anyway, since we don’t like the two-party structure. But we go to Europe and they’re playing our songs and we think, “How could this be happening?” These stations aren’t owned by corporations, so people are playing what they like. [In the U.S.] kind of as a lark, someone said, “Let’s go see Little Tim,” so we went out to a show and there was no one there. People aren’t even interested in this music. The corporations just decide who they’re going to promote, who’s going to make them money and that’s that. It’s everywhere, radio, cable TV: there are 250 channels but they’re owned by only 6 companies.

CJ: Is this why you own your own record label?

Eric Hilton: Definitely. We also looked at the experimentation done at Dischord, another independent label in DC and took cues from their experiences.

CJ: What do you see as the future of your label?

Eric Hilton: It was never our aim to grow, to be a big label. We’re happy where we are now, but it’s always great to find new bands that fit and that we’re excited about.

CJ: Some of your songs have been used in commercials – was that a difficult decision to reconcile with your anti-corporate stance?

Eric Hilton: Like a selling out? No, if a corporation wants to give us money we’ll take it. It also gives us an opportunity to reach new people – we’ve had fans come up to us and say “Hey! We heard your song in a car commercial and loved it,” and that’s fine.

CJ: Have you turned down offers from any corporations you didn’t agree with?

Eric Hilton: We’ve turned down offers.

CJ: You were involved in a tour this summer supporting the UN food program. How did you get involved in that?

Eric Hilton: They came to us. They didn’t have a local DC band and they came to us and asked us to be involved.

CJ: Is it something that you advocate your fans getting involved with?

Eric Hilton: Sure, we’ll give them a booth at our shows. We don’t announce things from the stage – not that we have anything against that – people are coming to our shows and it’s up to them what they want to spend their money on.

CJ: What do you think of bands trying to take control of their own music, like Radiohead did with their won album, selling it for what their fans think it’s worth?

Eric Hilton: It’s hard to see where that’s going I’m pretty sure that it worked out for them, but I think Radiohead probably has pretty ethical fans. Not that I can say any band’s fans are…unethical, but I can see that there may not be an incentive for bands like Thievery Corporation with younger fans to go that direction since they might not have the revenue stream to spend on music.

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