Thievery Corporation Biography

Thievery Corporation make abstract, instrumental, mid-tempo dance music somewhere between trip-hop and acid jazz. The production duo of Rob Garza and Eric Hilton, Thievery Corporation released a few warmly received singles on their own Eighteenth Street Lounge (ESL) label (named for their Washington, D.C. bar and nightclub) in 1996. Previously known primarily among acid jazz and rare-groove DJs, the group shot to minor celebrity when a track from one of their early 12"'s appeared on respected DJ/producers Kruder & Dorfmeister's mix session for Studio K7's DJ Kicks series. Similar in many respects (and more than just number) to that Viennese production duo, Thievery Corporation subsequently grew in popularity among a wider audience of DJs and headphonaunts. Their debut full-length appeared in 1997, along with a compilation of Washington, D.C.-based electronica artists, Dubbed Out in DC (both on ESL). After 4AD signed the duo they began work on their second LP but were forced to postpone the release date after tapes were stolen in a mugging. The stopgap remix compilation Abductions & Reconstructions was released in 1999, and their second proper album The Mirror Conspiracy followed a year later. Their growing fame made them a natural to select tracks for the 2001 Verve compilation Sounds From the Verve Hi-Fi, and one year later, the duo returned with a third production LP, The Richest Man in Babylon. The mix album Outernational Sound and remix EP Babylon Rewound appeared in 2004. The Cosmic Game from 2005 featured guest vocalists Perry Farrell, the Flaming Lips' Wayne Coyne, and David Byrne. A year later a second remix compilation, Versions, was released.

Sean Cooper.