The Strokes - '12:51' (Rough Trade)
5/5
By: Clara Burtenshaw
The Strokes: photogenic, sharply dressed, and with their musical-influences firmly rooted in the past, release perhaps one of the most eagerly anticipated, follow-up singles in recent years.
... And, yes, it's fair comment to pass that they have a lot to live up to, and - in theory - what with the maelstrom of scrutiny '12:51' has inevitably come under, most wouldn't like to be in their shoes right now. But that would be a lie. With the world at their sneakers, a brigade of hirsute apostles, not to mention deification by the popular press, these young men cannot put a brogue wrong - and let's face it, they are famous for a reason... Aside from the Elite models, Drew Barrymore and tie to classic songwriter Albert Hammond, The Strokes managed to encapsulate the attitudes and ideology of a past era, one lost amidst the indie and the grunge, and glossed it for our times. Look no further than the epitome of cool, post-punk and the new-wave... after-wave...
Yet for a band that nigh-on made every other act from the Big Apple 'just another New York band', sure the influences would remain the same, but the direction...? Well, '12:51' begins as it could have been the twelfth song on 'Is This It', yet - ten seconds in - and matters take a dramatic turn: a darker, promising prelude to a song that would stamp the five-piece out as worth all the hype, and a handclap more.
Possibly a striking reinvention of The Strokes we love, with synth-like distortion refining the guitar-lines - but then the climax is suddenly snatched away, and the build-up frustrated by a digital, Japanese-karaoke-melody that, if not deceptively simple, is simply deceptive. Cunningly, the song continues as a wrestling conflict between the two contrasting melodies, torn between lyrics that touch upon the questioning and meaningful, to 'f**k going to that party'.
And all in under three minutes, therein perhaps shall lay its success. If this had been released in 2001, it still would have elicited the same adoration and retrospective social-climate. And, even though it's two years later, the necessity of Casablancas and band still remains, as vibrant as ever. Though the sound has certainly progressed, after a two-year wait, we all expected - and hoped for - a different Strokes, and now it's here, seemingly, the patience was well called for.
Artists in this article: The Strokes
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