Up until march of 2020, NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert series used to take place under the florescent lights of NPR Music’s Washington D.C. office. Well known musicians and up-and-coming artists alike would situate themselves behind a pine desk cluttered with various knick-knacks to perform a handful of songs in front of an intimate audience. Now, each Tiny Desk performance takes place in a location of the artist’s choosing, and Baltimore punk band Turnstile definitely opted for a unique setting. Instead of an office building, the band perform their songs in a room jam-packed with hundreds of stuffed animals.
Despite the locale, Turnstile’s music is anything but plush and soft. The five-piece group fired off several songs from their well-received 2021 album Glow On, which raked No. 4 in the 2021 Uproxx Music Critics Poll. They started things off with a rush of energy on “Endless,” before moving through performances of their songs “Underwater Boi,” “Blackout,” “Don’t Play,” “Mystery,” “T.L.C. (Turnstile Love Connection),” and “Alien Love Call.”
While recording Glow On, Turnstile turned to several seasoned artists for assistance. The tapped notable producer Mike Elizondo, who is best known for his work on 50 Cent’s “In Da Club.” Blood Orange mastermind Dev Hynes also worked with Turnstile, featuring on the tracks “Alien Love Call” and “Lonely Dezires.” Indie musician Julien Baker provided backup vocals on Turnstile’s simmering track “Underwater Boi,” which bassist Franz Lyons described in an interview with Uproxx as “mad chill.” “It’s a real in-the-pocket head nod. And that song is just as strong as any other song on record,” he said.
Watch Turnstile’s NPR Tiny Desk Concert above.
Glow On is out now via Roadrunner Records. Get it here.
Turnstile is a Warner Music artist. .
