 photo by Amanda Jaffe Strokes, Kings Of Leon, Regina Spektor |
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The Strokes’ new album, Room On Fire, had not yet been released when the band took the stage at the Tower Theater for its first U.S. show in almost a year. The New York City quintet has a history with Philadelphia; the band’s two-month residency at a pair of Philly nightspots in 2001 helped spur a rise so meteoric that it caused deep divisions among the hipster listening public: Are the Strokes saviors of rock or pretenders to the throne? Consider tonight’s show the beginning of the band’s second act. Opener Regina Spektor, a Russian-born Brooklynite who claims musical influences as diverse as Ella Fitzgerald and Radiohead, presented the audience with a rather bizarre set. (There was an audience-participation session in which she had the crowd grunt the first syllable in “America.”) Spektor writes poppy songs and performs them with a slightly folksy twang; her fragile presence onstage—alone behind a piano—only made the material more endearing. If nothing else, her frizzy red hair was difficult to turn away from. The Kings Of Leon share two things with the Strokes: a label (RCA) and the kind of hype that’s difficult to circumvent. The Nashville band of brothers (plus a stray cousin) harbor serious misconceptions of what rock hair should look like, sporting shaggy, Southern-rock manes and mustaches. But mostly, the Kings Of Leon looked bored—the group’s performance was stale and unenergetic, the sluggishness of which may have been spurred by the audience’s lack of interest. By contrast, the Strokes strolled onstage like a group of professionals, offering a couple of waves and smiles before diving right into “Between Love And Hate.” (Fans recognized the song as live/bootleg favorite “Ze Newie,” but with a better title.) Nick Valensi and Albert Hammond Jr. played their guitars with passion and breezed through the new solos as though they had been playing them for years. Valensi (who rarely exhibits his cheery/social side) and bassist Nikolai Fraiture (who usually hides in the background) came out of their shells to engage the audience. The band’s energy was highly contagious, and though Julian Casablancas’ lyrics were typically unintelligible, no one soaked up the spotlight quite like the man himself. With little interruption—Casablancas summoned a young boy from the audience in a Yankees T-shirt to come onstage for an unsuccessful sing-along—the Strokes ripped through their set list in one hour, indulging the audience with most of the favorites from Is This It as well as 10 of the 11 songs from Room On Fire. With Fabrizio Moretti topping off the intensity on drums (comparisons to Animal from The Muppet Show are duly noted), the Strokes were tightly focused and clearly back in the performance groove. The energy of “12:51” and the near-sweetness of “Under Control” were enough to whet appetites for Room On Fire. Then—without an encore or even a cordial “It’s good to be back” speech—they walked off the stage the same way they came in, like five rock-star pros. Regardless of all the hype and the criticism, there’s still something about the Strokes that’s eminently likable. While their new set of songs maintains the sound that made them famous, you can still hear a musical progression and emotional maturity. You have to wonder whether, 20 years from now, the Strokes will still be around; if this is a band that’s in it for the long haul. By evening’s close, it felt like a successful Strokes’ future could be confirmed. —Eugenia Salvo |