New York City rock loyalists The Strokes are back from solo sabbaticals with their fourth LP Angles.
The album isn’t as brash as their earlier work, but the energy is directed to different channels, as inventive passages reveal new approaches. Tracks jump out; the rapid fire choruses and bridges in Machu Picchu are slashing and confident — songs within a song. But it all fits with the flow.
Many will recognize the recycled swagger of yore from the first notes of Under Cover of Darkness. The song is an exercise in offhand precision — the loose nature of the group is an illusion and creates the raw attack that got them noticed 10 years ago.
Angles is a sleek production, hot on compression and tight arrangements that were worked out over two years in several New York studios. Vocalist Julian Casablancas brings in touches of psychedelic drones that recall his recent solo album, and the guitar team of Albert Hammond Jr. and Nick Valensi indulge heavily in weaving and talk-back interplay. Their dynamic creates propulsive textures throughout.
Some of the material falls into the realm of eccentric pop-rock mined by ‘70s quirk kings The Cars (You’re So Right), but most of the songs pulse with a filtered take on ‘60s/‘70s psychedelia. Games rides a rainbow of whitewash reminiscent of trip-rock revivalists The Coral and Broken Bells. The Strokes get further in the weirdness on the way-left-of-centre track Call Me Back; fun, but indecipherable, like Beck at his oddest.
Gratisfaction and Life is Simple in the Moonlight then push the album back on track. These are melodically stirring and inspired songs that highlight the group’s shift in direction to adventurous risks in rocking that aim high while looking backward and forward.
Dean Gordon-Smith is a Vernon musician who writes music reviews for The Morning Star.
