What's the point of being the Last Gang in Town if you can't run a con game and rob old people? The Strokes — street kings of New York City's downtown rock scene since their 2001 platinum debut — have pulled a classic bait-and-switch on multiple levels, teasing the public with a return-to-Is This It single ("Under Cover of Darkness") and then Cars-jacking a guy who's now in his 60s (Ric Ocasek). Some of the weight of expectation borne by the Strokes' five-years-in-the-making fourth album belongs to Sofia Coppola; her soundtrack to Somewhere blazed the Strokes b-side "I'll Try Anything Once" — actually a demo version of 2006's "You Only Live Once" — into cinematic splendor. The song is feral and romantic, uncomfortably close and portraying frontman Julian Casablancas at his most human and very best, turning the act of being bored into existentialist art. There is nothing like it on Angles.

But there is "Under Cover of Darkness," a bejangled guitar-hook concession to the old, familiar Strokes sound that is, upon closer inspection, one of the better self-parodies in rock history. At various points during the song, Casablancas sings the following lines: "It's a nightmare." "I just won't… read more »