Thievery Corporation

Washington DC-based Thievery Corporation have long been renowned for their sumptuous blend of Worldbeat and Downtempo-flavoured Dub. Danny Turner speaks to one half of the production duo, Eric Hilton, about the making of their latest album, The Temple Of I & I

- Danny Turner

Drawn together by their shared love of the Washington DC club scene and Jamaican and Brazilian cultures, which act as a constant source of creative manna, Thievery Corporation’s Eric Hilton and Rob Garza combined gear and released their debut album Sounds From The Thievery Hi-Fi in 1996 on the duo’s own Eighteenth Street Lounge Records.

Over 20 years later, Hilton and Garza are still going strong. Fiercely independent, their sound is signified by a hypnotic blend of genre-bending Dub, Jazz and electronic-based styles – their live shows an extension of studio-based collaborations with multiple artists.

The duo’s tenth studio album, The Temple of I & I, typifies Thievery Corporation’s approach. Hilton and Garza visited Jamaica, bringing numerous session players along for the ride. Drawing tropical inspiration, the results of their collective jamming sessions were brought home to create another typically diverse brew of ethereal electronica.

FM: You’ve always had a very open-minded approach to your sound. Where does that derive from?

Eric Hilton: “It’s interesting, but from my point of view I actually think it derives from two very unlikely bands. One would be The Clash, who obviously started out as a very traditional Punk band and then dabbled in all kinds of different sounds, and the other one, oddly, would be The Style Council – Paul Weller’s outfit. Those are two groups that definitely branched out from one particular core genre and caught my attention. I get a little bored of bands that sound the same all the time. I love New Order and Joy Division, but don’t know if I’d wanna be in those groups for a long time, because you know what you’re going to get. But we’re not a band, we’re a production duo, so we can go wherever we want and try anything.”