Thievery Corporation will be playing three nights at the 9:30 Club. This is becoming a January tradition for the classy, dubby duo. They will be spinning their haunted downtempo tunes on Jan 21, 22, and 23. Tickets go on sale Thursday at 10 a.m.

Go ahead, call them chill-out. Deride them as background music. Thievery Corporation is having the last laugh. Now three nights into an epic sold out five-night stand at 930 Club it’s quite apparent that if the group does indeed dwell in the slow-groovin’ coffee shop of electronic music, well, it’s a coffee shop that everybody is waiting in line to get into. And why wouldn’t they? The DC-based duo of Rob Garza and Eric Hilton keep pretty good company–Femi Kuti, Anoushka Shankar, and Seu Jorge all drop in for appearances on Radio Retaliation. By adding a little bit of third world flavor to electronic music more than 10 years ago, Thievery Corporation inadvertently started on a journey that’s carried them out of DC and through the world’s clubs, concert halls, and DJ booths. Rob Garza took a moment to talk to City Paper about the group’s new record, its hometown, and how the heart of the band’s live show beats much faster than 95 bpm.

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Pitchfork slams the new Thievery Corporation album, Radio Retaliation. The reviewer gives it a 2.6. Ouch. There’s no mention in the review of the Chuck Brown cut. That alone is worth more than a 2.6! But here’s what the Pitchfork critic had to say in their first graph:

“Even at the height of their popularity in the late 1990s and early 00s, it was always difficult to imagine anyone getting worked up over Thievery Corporation. A watery cocktail of cul de sac genres like downtempo, lounge, and “world music” (more on that in a second), the Washington D.C. duo’s output has long worn its own inoffensiveness as a badge.”

It goes downhill from there. Pop Cesspool recently posted his own critique of the band.

Chuck Brown’s still got it. And the duo plays to his strengths laying down some solid rhythms. The damn fine tune is off the duo’s latest album Radio Retaliation. I have one question: Where did Thievery Corporation get that Caddy?