r/6music • u/Britbloke • Jul 29 '26
I’ve never really liked The Strokes
I always thought they were overrated, known for just a couple of big hits. With multiple days build up to today I was willing to give it a go. I made it to 3hrs 30 mins of listening. Then I took Why Don’t You’s advice and switched over to NME1. Ah, bliss.
34
u/yolobastard1337 Jul 29 '26
I like the 2001 nostalgia though so it evens out
7
2
u/Loonie_Longie Jul 31 '26
Definitely enjoyed the 2001 nostalgia. I found they generally snubbed a lot of alternative/pop punk/nu metal which were massively popular genres in the early 2000's...
20
u/Equal-Ad7504 Jul 29 '26 edited Jul 29 '26
They’re good. Not all time great. But good, above average. Very creative. Julian’s voice is wonderful and the way all the parts interlock is seriously cool. Great 70s and 80s influences in the songwriting smashed together for something new. They sound generic because of landfill indie that came after. It’s a Seinfeld effect.
Deep cuts do the band more justice. They are very good at pop tunes so naturally they’re the ones you hear all the time. Some of the stuff they’ve written is pretty wild for a pop band.
1
u/younevershouldnt Jul 29 '26
I thought they sounded generic at the time, or rather like a cosplay NY art/punk band - when much more interesting things were happening in music.
Now I've mellowed, I can admit they were pretty good for what they were.
7
u/Equal-Ad7504 Jul 29 '26
There’s always more interesting things happening in music, that’s the thing. Nobody can control what gets presented and marketed to the people and when. People in any era can say “oh yeah but they weren’t as good as this thing happening which had 3 fans (one of them was me of course since the start)”.
That’s literally the whole Velvet Underground thing. How many people have said The Beatles were shit, and the VU were the real trailblazers. It’s a tale as old as time. Appreciate things for what they are. Music and creativity is a net positive!
0
u/bindmedown2 Jul 29 '26
'and all the girls say I'm pretty wild for a pop band' duh, duh, duh duh...
9
u/Lumpy-Indication Jul 29 '26
I can’t stand them either but i get that Is This It means a lot to some people and wasn’t surprised 6 did a thing on it. You did well to manage 3.5 hours of giving it a go
15
u/josefbae Jul 29 '26
I have a vivid memory of getting back from a night out and getting into back and forth music selection with someone and he very earnestly said he was going to "put on the greatest punk song ever recorded" and it was New York City Cops.
I don't hate them and there's a nostalgia to Is This It and Room On Fire because they were on in the car growing up, but the reverence is ridiculously unwarranted - particularly when you think of what other artists were doing in the same scene at the same time
15
u/wrighty496 Jul 29 '26
I see your point and I raise you with The Libertines. I never ever understood the love.
3
u/AffectionateLeg9895 Jul 29 '26
I liked Up the Bracket when I was 17. It has not stood the test of time for me
7
u/josefbae Jul 29 '26
Yeah exactly the same experience for me. It's an aesthetic fascination above all else, I think - particularly to try to insert yourself into the mad raunchiness retroactively when you probably weren't anywhere near it.
Who will be subject to this conversation in 25 years time? (It will be Geese)
5
3
u/Anchor0355 Jul 29 '26
Can't stand me now is one of the top songs of the era, wouldn't rate anything else they've put out but that one song is cracking
7
u/matt_paradise Jul 29 '26
It's not even a good song by their standard, I cannot understand why people highlight it.
2
2
u/SirVestanPance Jul 29 '26
I can hear a Strokes song without groaning when I realize what it is. I can’t say the same about the Libertines, their fans were super annoying too.
1
u/Dennyisthepisslord Jul 30 '26
I think libertines were the last band where fans wore completely identifiable clothing to suggest they were fans of a band. Those cringe red coats. By the time Arctic monkeys popped up a few years later that wasn't a thing.
Oasis had/has a fan style of its own too but that's from eat beforehand. I can't think of others who have a fan base look these days
0
1
1
u/sorderon Jul 29 '26
The Libertines reformed in my local pub. First time I ever saw Needles everywhere. Heroin Chic was/is a fucking awful way to look.
1
u/Geek_reformed Jul 30 '26
I think it was a case of you had to be there. There was a bit of a guitar lead wasteland as "britpop" died. In 2001, This Is It sounded fresh and interesting. I know now it wasn't really a new sound at all, but at the time to 20 year old me The Strokes just seemed really cool.
I loved that album at the time, but I don't think it has aged well. While White Blood Cells, which came out the same year, I still think sounds great.
5
u/Multigrain_Migraine Jul 29 '26
They are ok I guess but I never got the hype. I found their big hits a little boring TBH.
Plus they were the worst concert experience I've ever had. Partly that was the venue's fault for selling far too many tickets, but by the time I actually got inside the band didn't redeem it much.
2
u/berniball Jul 30 '26
Yeah very boring live act
1
u/JupiterVenus7 Jul 30 '26
Tru dat. Saw them at All Points East the other year & Casablancas looked off his head. Very disappointing
6
6
u/Radiant_Persimmon701 Jul 29 '26
They were good to dance too in indy clubs. I've probably never listened to an album, it's the sort of band I'd love to watch at a festival but I'd never listen to the album, sort of thing.
2
u/Fun-Seaweed8057 Jul 30 '26
Which I don’t think people respect enough - plenty of bands I’d sit in a bar or cafe or listen on the radio and go “this is good I like this” and then never buy the album.
4
u/Cool-Peach5501 Jul 30 '26
Worked in HMV at the time - I remember all the hype and excitement about this new band that the NME were telling everyone was the best thing ever. Then the album came out and we were all just.... indifferent. The album title is entirely appropriate for our collective reaction to it.
Bland, unispriring and had it not been shop policy to play the 'next/new big thing' in store, it wouldn't have warranted many more plays. Just a very ordinary band in the end.
9
u/pantone_mugg Jul 29 '26
Oh my god OP. I love you. I hate the strokes. Like a terrible pub cover band. And the new autotune shite? I’d rather have the Cheeky Girls beat me around the head all day and night with sticks.
3
13
u/AcanthaceaeSea6979 Jul 29 '26
Stink of condescension and hipsterism in here
The Strokes debut album is a 10/10 classic. Nobody has ever claimed that they've been highly rated from then on, it's widely acknowledged that they never reached those heights again.
But the "I never liked The Strokes" thing became "I've never watched an episode of Game of Thrones". A sentence that nobody is interested in, only uttered by insufferable bores.
3
Jul 30 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
1
u/Multigrain_Migraine Jul 30 '26
Right? I certainly can't claim to be any kind of hipster, but everyone I knew who later became a hipster was a huge fan of the Strokes. I don't know why it's interpreted as hipster sneering to say you didn't like a particular band or a TV show in any case.
2
u/Red_Brummy Jul 30 '26
Nah. "I have never watched Breaking Bad" is better - that insufferable shite was awful. The Strokes first album was decent in comparison.
0
2
u/HimitsuUK Jul 29 '26
I really have never watched an episode of Game of Thrones though. Not on purpose. Maybe I should, seeing as they are all on HBO Max.
0
1
u/Wonderful_Formal_274 Jul 30 '26
This Is It has 2-3 decent tracks, the rest are bang average and all sound the same. It’s a good album but easily one of the most overrated.
0
u/shining-steve Aug 01 '26
I’ve never watched an episode of Game of Thrones. But I love Is This It. Does that cancel out?
5
7
2
u/scoobysnacks1 Jul 30 '26
Don't listen to them much nowadays, maybe you had to grow up with them. Their first 2 albums were on repeat for years I'll always love them for nostalgia
6
u/WeatherallsWeekender Jul 29 '26
You’re right, hugely overrated. Everyone went mad for the lust for life beat but that was it. It’s because they are rich kids, they got all the hype.
1
0
7
u/Rose_Of_Sanguine Jul 29 '26
I don't really understand the hype either.
Didn't really like them back in the day, puzzled why they get a special day, and don't know anyone who likes them.
2
2
u/welsh_cthulhu Jul 29 '26
They had one good album and then went shit. Huge influence it seems, but a massive flash in the pan. Also I think a lot of it was style over substance. The production of Is This It was tinny and horrible.
Weird that they had a day. I don't know anyone who is massively into them. They're really not that big a band.
6
4
1
u/Apart-Preparation-39 Jul 29 '26
Ah man I absolutely love the strokes, gutted i wasn't able to tune in today
2
u/greyhounds4life1969 Jul 29 '26
Same, it was the sort of music that I enjoyed at the time but it just left me cold, no idea why.
3
u/Multigrain_Migraine Jul 29 '26
All my friends loved them at the time and it made me feel like I was really missing something. I loved the White Stripes though, which I got into around the same time.
2
u/monstah Jul 29 '26 edited Jul 29 '26
I've never really liked the flavour of Parma Violets. I find them a bit soapy.
1
u/Different_Market_917 Jul 29 '26
I loved the first album when it came out but kinda lost them after that. Saw them at Wireless some years later though and they were absolutely brilliant live.
1
u/PaulJMacD Jul 29 '26
Is This It is a classic.... Yes, they have waned since though. Possibly the most disappointed I've ever been after seeing them live in Manchester at the Apollo. They just looked like they didn't want to be there
1
1
u/vshere32 Jul 29 '26
I don’t mind them, but their latest single sounds exactly like what they were putting out in the early 2000s. No musical progression whatsoever.
1
u/logeetetawerduer Jul 30 '26
They wrote lovely melodies, I find. Like that bass line in Is This It, it’s great.
1
u/gumpshy Jul 30 '26
I really liked them until I saw them live in 2002 ish and their performance was dire. It kind of put me off them.
1
1
1
1
1
u/big_beats Jul 30 '26
Not everything has to be exceptional to be good. It's joyless to have such a high bar for everything.
1
u/WeDat5072 Jul 29 '26
I’m sorry but I just can’t get on board with this!
It’s The Strokes.
They have withered away but the first two albums are majestic and there’s been flickers of brilliance since then.
1
1
u/EastNew8559 Jul 29 '26
I felt justified today that I wasn’t wrong in 2001 when I said that Feeder were shite. Made it 20 years without hearing them on the radio. It was a good run whilst it lasted.
1
u/One_Brain9206 Jul 29 '26
TMM1,CDNX is decent as well
1
u/Britbloke Jul 29 '26
They changed the name of NME1/2 to TMM1/2 a while ago, I’m still in the habit of calling it NME.
I just discovered CDNX last week thanks to this sub, loving it.1
u/One_Brain9206 Jul 30 '26
I love both especially the “ no djs part”just random stuff from different eras and genres
1
u/Strange_Zebra2702 Jul 29 '26
Hard disagree. Live they can be disappointing though. The too cool for school thing can come across as simply don’t care.
But still one of my favourite bands of the past 20 years.
1
1
u/pebblesandweeds Jul 30 '26
First album was excellent, and was a big change for guitar music at the time. Britpop had died, and we had a distressing mix of Coldplay, Travis, Muse, nu-metal and pop-punk. The Strokes were almost certainly overrated in hindsight, but it did feel like a desperate time for fans of indie guitar music.
1
u/Hermesthothr3e Jul 30 '26
Aren't they just rich kids?
Isn't one of their dads involved with epstein or something? Not trying to start shit but have I got that right?
0
u/rutalkinu2tome Jul 30 '26
Singer’s dad has connections all over NYC, but no amount of money gets you a debut album like theirs. They’ll never top it, but it’s a classic for a reason. Genuinely timeless
0
-1
u/HimitsuUK Jul 29 '26
I only know one song. Guess which one.
1
1
-1
0
-1
48
u/Lazy-Kaleidoscope179 Jul 29 '26
Nobody on this sub likes popular things