Humble, handsome and an
international music deity, Julian Casablancas is on top of the world. Casablancas
and his band, The Strokes, entered the atmosphere of music like an asteroid
with a hugely successful EP called The
Modern Age. This EP sparked a bidding war between record companies that had
not been seen amongst a rock and roll band for years and saw a revival in
garage rock amongst a society plagued by Britney Spears and Destiny’s Child (cue vomiting noise).
It all started in the early 90’s.
Julian’s stepfather, Sam Adoquei, introduced him to The Doors Greatest Hits. Julian locked himself in his room for the
whole night and dreamed of creating something this good. Queen and The Cars
CD's were also given to Julian which later become massive influences on his own music. At the age of 13, he was sent to an elite boarding
school in Switzerland where he met future guitarist, Albert Hammond Jr. The two
of them were often caught smoking and drinking on campus and were regulars in
detention. Although they never finished high school, they continued to take music
classes – which obviously paid off. After The Strokes break onto the big stage
with their debut album Is This It,
they got a taste for something that would play a huge role in their lives…
Drugs. The Bain of musical
talent. The silent assassin well known for taking such lives as Michael
Jackson, Whitney Houston and Kurt Cobain, almost succeeded in an attempt on
Julian Casablancas. On the topic of heroin he says, "Doing
heroin is like walking around with a terrorist as your friend. It's like taking
a terrorist around to parties. You never know when it's going to blow up on
you." Because of heroin and other hardcore substances, The Strokes almost
disbanded. Guitarist, Nick Valensi, said in an interview with The Face, “If half the band does drugs and the other half of the band
doesn’t do drugs, you will break up in the next six months.” And Julian
extrapolated, “So we all do drugs.” That was in 2001. In 2007, the band wanted
to get into the studio to start recording their fourth album, but it just didn't work.
As a group and as individuals, they were too disjointed. They didn’t talk to
each other for months on end and Julian was struggling with drugs and alcohol.
By 2008, some of the other band members had released solo work. So Julian
decided to settle down, throw away the syringe and flush the powder, and get
serious.
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| L to R: Albert, Nicolai, Julian, Nick and Fab |
The changed man started
recording solo tunes for what eventually became a highly successful album. Phrazes For The Young had a theme to it
that was almost angelic compared to the previous Strokes albums, which were all
about “not giving a f***”. Each new song had a quote that went with it. One was
particularly deep – “Drunkenness is cowardice, sobriety is loneliness”.
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| Fourth Album: Angles |
In 2010, Casablancas had
his first child with wife Juliet. Now completely clean, sober and settled,
Julian and the band reunited to create their fourth album, Angles. However, the new album brought up a new question. Is this music good enough? Is this it?
The album was a commercial
failure compared to their previous work and the fans were left in bitter disappointment after such a long hiatus only to come up with something that
didn’t sound like The Strokes at all. It was filled with synthesiser and instruments no one had ever heard of. Julian himself said in an interview with NME,
“60% of the album is crap; I hate most of it.” Who knows why he let it go
ahead… In any case he also stated, “we’re already working on a new album. We’re
trying to get back what we had ten years ago.”
