I was awoken on February 12 from a text from my best friend Aelena Gillies saying “So The Strokes officially came back today, there’s a new song, I’m just- I’m sad Nadia.” The Strokes are back? Now, you can imagine my confusion as my friend is a massive Strokes fan and even turned me on to them and began telling me her distaste for the new song. But as she was telling me this, I kept thinking, the Strokes are back! I remembered that the band played a show on New Year’s Eve and announced that they would be putting new music out along with an album. “Yeah, we’ve got a new album coming out soon!” Julian Casablancas the lead singer stated at their Dec. 31 show  “2020 here we come.” I guess the Strokes really are here to stay.

Here’s a brief  history of the Strokes for people who may not know much about the garage rockers . The band formed in New York City in 1998 by singer Julian Casablancas, guitarist Albert Hammond Jr., guitarist Nick Valensi, drummer Fabrizo Moretti and bassist Nikolai Fraiture. They released their debut album Is This it in 2001 which instantly was a hit and was named album of the decade in 2009 by NME. They came out in the post punk/post grunge music scene created in the 90’s and left for the new young kids to make names for themselves.They gained a large following and many musicians of the 21st century credit the band’s first two albums to be their breaking point in wanting to become a musician. Over the last 20 years they released five full length albums. 

The band released a single titled “At The Door” on Tuesday Feb. 11 which left many confused but mainly fans liked it. Many complained about the drums or lack thereof. The song starts with a synth intro and Casablancas vocals. The lyrics are very hard hitting. They talk about what I’m imagining is Casablancas life experience, using many metaphors , and asking for help in some form. The song is good but it could be better musically. The melody is nice and flows well with the lyrics. The song could use the synth and maybe make the chorus bigger with the use of guitars and go back to their roots. As an artist you don’t always want to recreate your best album and do the same thing over again but they shouldn’t leave behind their big chorus rock style and their crunchy in your face guitar sound created by Hammond Jr. and Valensi. 

I asked my close friend and long time Strokes fan Aelena what she thinks of the new single. She voiced almost my same opinion. “While I understand The Stroke’s desire to change their sound, being they have been heavily criticized for every album since Is This It and seeing that they have matured since their debut and sophomore efforts, I think “At The Door” is too much of a drift from the classic Strokes sound that much of their audience, including myself, loves and expects.” Aelena got into the Strokes her freshman year of high school and has stuck with them being a big fan since.

The band posted on their social medias on 18 Feb. that they will be releasing a new single on 19 Feb. called “Bad Decisions.” The album The New Abnormal is set to be released on April 10, 2020.