"I haven’t been in this studio since my second-grade class took the NBC
tour years ago,” blurts 51-year-old Living Colour guitarist and founder
Vernon Reid. Onstage at Late Night With Jimmy Fallon after
a rehearsal, the group—best known for its soaring, catchy 1988 megahit
“Cult of Personality” and a now long ago habit of wearing bright
spandex—is back, still endeavoring to mix commercial pop and agitprop.

Their new album, The Chair in the Doorway, features the
single they just thrashed through, called “Behind the Sun.” It’s about
Katrina. “Originally, Vernon and I started writing ‘Behind the Sun’
with ‘The World Is a Ghetto’ kind of theme,” singer Corey Glover, 44,
says, referencing the classic War song about universal poverty. “But
after my wife and I went to New Orleans earlier this year and witnessed
firsthand how devastated that part of the country still is four years
later, I felt compelled to change the lyrics.”

For the rest
of this story, go to: http://nymag.com/news/int...nter/59701