unofficial 2025 cassette reissue - Blessed and cursed with an enormous amount of advance hype from the British press, the Strokes proved they were one of the few groups deserving of glowing reviews with Is This It. Granted, their faultless influences -- especially the Stooges, Lou Reed, and the Velvet Underground -- have "critics' darlings" written all over them. However, the Strokes don't rehash the sounds that inspire them; they remake them in their own image. The band's pop-inflected, second-generation take on late-'70s New York punk comes complete with raw, world-weary vocals, spiky guitars, and an insistently chugging backbeat that all sound familiar, but the songs on their debut album also reflect their own early-twenties lust for life.
| A1 | Is This It |
| A2 | The Modern Age |
| A3 | Soma |
| A4 | Barely Legal |
| A5 | Someday |
| B6 | Alone, Together |
| B7 | Last Nite |
| B8 | Hard To Explain |
| B9 | New York City Cops |
| B10 | Trying Your Luck |
| B11 | Take It Or Leave It |
