The Story
Rob Garza and Eric Hilton met in 1995 at Hilton's Washington, D.C. club, the Eighteenth Street Lounge, and started talking about the music they loved — bossa nova, reggae, Indian sitar, old European soundtracks — and how to bring it into the present with electronic production. Their first day working together, they finished a song that ended up on their debut album; they eventually moved into the top floor of the Lounge itself to keep recording, and launched their own label, ESL Music, in 1996.
The Mirror Conspiracy (2000) established the duo's downtempo, genre-blending sound on a wider stage. By Radio Retaliation (2008), the music had become explicitly political, addressing war and civil liberties directly rather than staying purely atmospheric — a shift NPR covered as part of the album's release.
Rather than working with a fixed lineup, Thievery Corporation records and tours with a rotating cast of vocalists and musicians, keeping the two founders as the constant thread across a catalog that runs from Saudade (2014) through Treasures from the Temple (2018).
Garza and Hilton have stayed based in Washington, D.C. since 1995, running their studio, label and club out of the same city rather than relocating to a coastal industry hub — 'we're from here,' as Hilton put it, simply.