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Avg: 4.0 (1411 ratings)
- Date Released: August 20, 2002
- Genre: Alternative/Punk
- Style: Indie Rock, Post-Punk
- Label: Matador
Interpol's already classic debut album fits the times like an Armani suit.
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We Say...
In rock music, as in life, being in the right place at the right time is everything. Into the grave new world of 2002, New York quartet Interpol released a debut album that embodied a seemingly paradoxical blend of melancholy and desperate hope, a romantic sense of depression. The Germans call it Weltschmerz, and it fit the times like an Armani suit.
While singer Paul Banks delivers dire lines like "You go stabbing yourself in the neck" in a foreboding baritone brimming with dread, it's redeemed by catchy drums, propulsive melodies and bass lines that lumber and veer like a practiced drunk. And yet for all its drama, Turn On bears the comfort of the familiar, echoing early '80s English bands like Joy Division, the Smiths and Echo and the Bunnymen — bands who also happened to hail from troubled northern towns.
It's a city album — every immaculate surface of the recording is spit-shined with carefully calibrated reverb redolent of skyscraper lobbies and urban canyons. Declaring "Subway is a porno," "NYC" nails the love/hate relationship New Yorkers have with their city; the song is the very soul of urban sophistication. Elsewhere, things can turn sentimental, but only to affirm a re-emerging faith in rock music as vehicle for salvation. When Banks intones, "We have 200 couches where you can sleep tonight," you believe him. -
They Say...
One might go into a review like this one wondering how many words will pass before Joy Division is brought up. In this case, the answer is 16. Many are too quick to classify Interpol as mimics and lose out on discovering that little more than an allusion is being made. The music made by both bands explores the vast space between black and white and produces something pained, deftly penetrating, and beautiful. Save for a couple vocal tics, that's where the obvious parallels end. The other fleeting comparisons one can one whip up when talking about Interpol are several -- roughly the same amount that can be conjured when talking about any other guitar/drums/vocals band formed since the '90s. So, sure enough, one could play the similarity game with this record all day and bring up a pile of bands. It could be a detrimental thing to do, especially when this record is so spellbinding and doesn't deserve to be mottled with such bilge. However, this record is a special case; slaying the albatross this band has been unfairly strangled by is urgent and key. Let's: there's another Manchester band at the heart of "Say Hello to the Angels," but that heart is bookended by a beginning and end that approaches the agitated squall of Fugazi; the torchy, elegiac "Leif Erikson" plays out like a missing scene from the Afghan Whigs' Gentlemen; the upper-register refrain near the close of "Obstacle 1" channels Shudder to Think. This record is no fun at all, the tension is rarely resolved, and -- oh no! -- it isn't exactly revolutionary, though some new shades of gray have been discovered. But you shouldn't allow your perception to be fogged by such considerations when someone has just done it for you and, most importantly, when all this brilliance is waiting to overwhelm you.
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| 01. |  |
Untitled |
3:56 |
|
| 02. | |
Obstacle 1 |
4:11 |
|
| 03. | |
NYC |
4:19 |
|
| 04. | |
PDA |
4:59 |
|
| 05. | |
Say Hello To The Angels |
4:28 |
|
| 06. | |
Hands Away |
3:05 |
|
| 07. | |
Obstacle 2 |
3:47 |
|
| 08. | |
Stella Was A Diver And She Was Always Down |
6:28 |
|
| 09. | |
Roland |
3:35 |
|
| 10. | |
The New |
6:07 |
|
| 11. | |
Leif Erikson |
4:00 |
|
11 Total Tracks, 48:55 Total Length
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Credits
- Greg Calbi - Mastering // Gareth Jones - Mixing // Peter Katis - Engineer // Peter Katis - Mixing // Sam Fogarino - ? // Sean McCabe - Design // Sean McCabe - Photography // Interpol - Main Performer // Daniel Kessler - ? // Paul Banks - ? // Andrew Zaeh - Photography
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