Interpol "Antics" - Retrospective Review

8.5/10

Antics was never going to have an easy job. Interpol was coming off Turn on the Bright Lights, an album that was not only one of the best indie rock debuts of the 21st century, but one of the best rock albums of its era altogether. Some bands pull off the impossible and top their debut — Pixies come to mind — but that is the exception, not the rule. So while Antics is a clear step down from the shadowy perfection of Turn on the Bright Lights, that almost says more about the debut than it does about this record. Judged on its own, this is still a hell of a sophomore album, and one that continued Interpol’s dark, magnetic grip on the New York indie scene.

That scene, looking back now, really was a special moment. The Strokes tend to get remembered as the obvious face of early-2000s New York indie rock, and fair enough, they had the look, the swagger, and the instantly recognizable songs. But make no mistake — Interpol was right there with them, and depending on what you want out of a rock band, I’m not sure they weren’t better. Where The Strokes made downtown cool feel loose, effortless, and fuzzy, Interpol made it feel cold, dramatic, anxious, and enormous. Antics does not have quite the same danger or mystery as Turn on the Bright Lights, but it still sounds like a band operating in a world they created for themselves.

Daniel Kessler’s guitar playing is still a major force here. His playing is sharp, stylish, and constantly moving without ever feeling like guitar-guy nonsense. Mr. Kessler has certainly always had a knack for creating generally simple, catchy, and emotive guitar riffs — Antics is no exception. To me, it always seemed like feel was so much more important than technicality; his ability to create mesmerizing soundscapes dotted with brief, yet memorable guitar licks, is amongst the best within this scene. Carlos D, meanwhile, holds the whole thing down with the kind of bass playing that made Interpol feel heavier and more physical than a lot of their peers. He was never just filling space underneath the guitars — he was giving the band its spine. Plus how about that hair too? If my memory serves me correctly, I believe this was before his bolo tie wearing days, where he still looked like a vampire... Anyway, that rhythm section is a huge reason why songs like Slow Hands hit as hard as they do, with that track coming the closest Interpol get here to the dance-punk pulse of their NYC siblings Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Even now, every time I hear Slow Hands, I just think about how cool that song really is, and how out of their wheelhouse it truly is, yet they nail it — and they did it AGAIN on their next album, Our Love to Admire, with The Heinrich Maneuver. We'll call it perhaps, an unintended homage to Yeah Yeah Yeahs.

The real standout, though, is Evil, the catchiest song on the album, and probably the one that best proves Interpol could write something close to a hit without sanding down what made them strange. It's always such a treat to hear indie bands seemingly effortlessly create a top-notch pop song, just to show they can — so cool. Regardless, the vocal moment that sticks with me most might be the chorus on C’Mere, where Paul Banks sounds about as frantic and chaotic as he ever has. Banks is a great singer, but not in the traditional sense at all. He is not blowing anyone away with range or technical perfection; he is great because his voice always sounds slightly off-center — pleasant, cold, dramatic, and unsettling all at once. It is funny picturing Paul Banks as a kid in choir class, because I can’t imagine the teacher saying, “Good, but could you talk through half the melody, sound vaguely alarmed, and make the rest of the room uncomfortable — you know, like if Ian Curtis and D. Boon had a kid?” On C’Mere, that oddness becomes the whole point, with the band turning his panic into one of the album’s strongest and most memorable moments.

Then there is A Time to Be So Small, which closes the album with real weight. It has that room-filling, emotional quality that reminds me of The New, reaching for the same kind of grand, wounded rock drama that Interpol could do better than almost anyone. That is where Antics ultimately lands for me. It is not Turn on the Bright Lights, and it was probably never going to be. But it is still a powerful, stylish, deeply satisfying record from a band in the middle of one of indie rock’s finest early-career runs. For most bands, this would be the masterpiece. For Interpol, it is “only” an 8.5/10 — which says everything about how absurdly high they set the bar. And not for nothing, it tops The Strokes’ sophomore release, Room on Fire...