Band members Fabrizio Moretti, Albert Hammond Jr., Nick Valensi, Julian Casablancas, and Nikolai Fraiture lounge backstage at the Fillmore in San Francisco, 2001.

Strokes Schadenfreude

Twenty-five years after the release of The Strokes’ debut album, Is This It, a new book examines how the band struggled to outrun its rich-kid reputation

By Steven Hyden

My central thesis about the Strokes—that their career is composed of a never-ending series of rises and falls—is predicated on the uniquely turbulent perception this band has engendered throughout its existence. I believe this was true in real time, in that nearly all the Strokes’ moves since their 2001 debut album, Is This It, have been framed as relative disappointments. And I believe this has been true in hindsight, in that Strokes-related events that might have initially been classified as letdowns or downright failures get reclassified as “actually great” triumphs whenever a more recent thing comes along that is quickly judged as comparably mediocre. In the story of the Strokes, every rise is followed by a crushing fall, only that fall turns into another rise upon the arrival of the next fall.

While I was aware of this trend going into the writing of Is This It: The Never-Ending Rise and Fall of the Strokes (And Rock ’n’ Roll), I was constantly surprised by how often the pattern recurred. For instance, in 2002, the Strokes were nominated in the International Newcomer Award category at the British Record Industry Trusts Show (BRITs). Comparable to the Best New Artist award at the Grammys, the honor had in previous years been bestowed on the likes of Nirvana, Björk, Alanis Morissette, Lisa Loeb, and MC Hammer. This particular year, the other nominees included the now mostly forgotten American singer-songwriter Anastacia, the B-level Canadian dance-pop artist Nelly Furtado, the pioneering Australian “sampledelia” electronic act Avalanches, and the bestselling nu-metal band Linkin Park. The presenter was Samantha Mumba, a fetching Irish singer and model, who scarcely glanced at the envelope before announcing the Strokes as the winners.