Music / Return to Cookie Mountain

Say, say, my playmate, won't you lay your hands on me?

Return to Cookie Mountain is the second studio album by the Brooklyn Alternative Indie band TV on the Radio, released in 2006. It is for all intents and purposes their first album as a full band, with multi-instrumentalist Dave Sitek, guitarist/vocalist Kyp Malone and lead vocalist Tunde Adebimpe having their sound fleshed out by drummer Jaleel Bunton and bassist Gerard Smith. The album produced "Wolf Like Me", the band's most successful single to date.

---

Tracklist

Side One

1. "I Was a Lover" – 4:21
2. "Hours" – 3:55
3. "Province" – 4:37
4. "Playhouses" – 5:11
5. "Wolf Like Me" – 4:39
6. "A Method" – 4:25

Side Two

1. "Let the Devil In" – 4:27
2. "Dirtywhirl" – 4:15
3. "Blues from Down Here" – 5:17
4. "Tonight" – 6:53
5. "Wash the Day" – 8:08

---

I was a troper, before this war:

• All of the Other Reindeer: "Hours" sounds like it's addressed to someone who's an outcast in this way.
  You walked around, thought yourself beautiful
  Just too bad they stared, Just too bad they stared
  Broke up your crown, called you "unusuable"
  See how well you fared.
• Deliberately Monochrome: The music video for "Province" is black and white, resembling an old wartime propaganda reel gone surreal.
• Epic Rocking: Album closer "Wash the Day Away" breaks the 8 minute mark.
• Green Aesop: The "beg the bee's forgiveness" line from "Let the Devil In" refers to the ecological phenomenon of colony collapse disorder, which has led to die-offs of bees worldwide.
• Hell Is That Noise: The verse-to-chorus transition in "Let the Devil In" can be rather jarring.
• One-Word Title: "Hours", "Province", "Playhouses", "Dirtywhirl", "Tonight".
• Our Werewolves Are Different: The subject of "Wolf Like Me" and its music video, which shows them transforming between humans and regular wolves.
  Got a curse, I cannot lift
  Shines when the sunset shifts
  When the moon is round and full
  Gotta bust that box, gotta gut that fish
• Precision F-Strike: From "A Method":
  It's a rough wild world could you please chaperone
  It's a mind field trip, oh leave it the fuck alone.
• Repetitive Audio Glitch: The music on "I Was a Lover" is a little distorted, sounding at times like a breaking mp3.
• Sampling: "I Was a Lover" uses a sample from Massive Attack's "Teardrop". Yes, making it a cousin of the House theme.
• Shapeshifting Excludes Clothing: In the music video for "Wolf Like Me", when the werewolves transform back into human form, they're all naked.
• Something Blues: "Blues from Down Here".
• Special Guest:
  • Adebimpe and Malone harmonize with none other than David Bowie on "Province".
  • Chris Taylor from Grizzly Bear plays horn on "Blues from Down Here".