Jem Aswad Senior Music Editor Two decades ago, as the turn-of-the-century NYC indie-rock scene burst out of its East Village and Williamsburg incubators, few probably expected that the Yeah Yeah Yeahs would end up having the most wide-ranging career of the bunch.
After all, a trio consisting of a wiz-kid guitarist, powerhouse drummer and a fireball lead singer might have made for explosive shows and a scrappy, deceptively diverse debut EP, but with no shade intended to the Strokes, Interpol, LCD Soundsystem, TV on the Radio and all the others, the multiple musical directions the band would go did not seem to be in the cards.
The Yeahs had the first hit single of the pack (2003’s “Maps”) and varied their approach with each successive album, peaking with 2009’s unexpectedly electronic-heavy “It’s Blitz.” That album represented the end of that particular thread: The group released one more, rockier album “Mosquito” in 2013 (which, significantly, fulfilled their major-label contract) and then basically went on hiatus.
In the years since, singer Karen O released a stellar collaboration with Danger Mouse, “Lux Prima” and co-composed the score for the animated film “Where Is Anne Frank?,” guitarist Nick Zinner also scored films and worked with Phoebe Bridgers and Songhoy Blues, and drummer Brian Chase started his own label.
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