Daveportivo's Cultural Evaluation Facility

So who knocked the Libertines out of the top ten? Franz Ferdinand of course! This is an album that had it all, it was vitally important, had huge influence, proved the blue print for years of spikey indie pop and best of all it was bloody brilliant from start to finish. However all these factors aside Franz Ferdinand proved that they had "it", that X factor that makes a band or an album special, Franz were perfect they looked cooler than all the competition without actually being cool, they had the coolest artwork yet it wasn't, Franz were unexplainable. Alex Kapranos was a style icon, a trend setter, a scene leader, but not one people would openly speak of because he wasn't a grass roots hero like Alex Turner or Liam Gallagher, he was just Art Pop personified. Something about Franz was distinctly European and cold, from the album artwork, to the dresscode it seemed like Kruatrock but it didn't sound like Krautrock, Franz simple were "it".

Musically it was definitely 21st Century, tight knit, short sharp songs, never over staying their welcome all perfect slaps of art pop. However Franz didn't sound remotely contemporary, they didn't feel like a post Strokes band, the only thing that can date this record is the hordes of subsiquent imitations that followed. The Franz formula is simple sharp dueling guitars, and stomping rhythm section that demands you dance and Alex Kapranos quasi-sexy peodophilic croon. Like an evil Scottish dandy, your never quite sure if he's trying to start a riot, wallow in his own sense of apathy or if he's trying to chat you up. Whatever he's trying to do it works to perfections. His sense of tone and pitch are sublime and just dripping with cool, his delivery on Dark Of The Matinee as he rolls his eyes and passively yawns "I Charm You And Tell You Of The Boys I Hate, All The Girls I Hate, The Words I Hate, The Clothes I Hate, Ooh How I'll Never Be All The Things I Hate". There's a certain distainful nonchalance to his delivery that adds a sense of mournful depression to his vocals, Auf Achse shows Kapranos' subtly at its best "You See Her But You Can't Touch Her / You Hear Her But You Can't Hold Her".

The musical analysis is almost besides the point because what Franz Ferdinand greatest achievement will always be will be reclaiming the dancefloors in the name of rock and roll. Every track of this album jolts and buzzes perfectly it was made to dance, groove and throw shapes to. The choruses are all suitably huge, the guitar hooks are unmistakeable and practicly everytrack on the album could be released as a single. Everyone has their favorite whether its the desperate yelps of Tell Her Tonight, the irresitable stomp of Take Me Out or the camp-arific Michael. Micheal will always be my favorite the balls of Kapranos to get the dancefloors of the nation shouting "I'm Sexy, I'm Sexy So Come And Dance With Me Michael....Sticky Hair Sticky Lips Stubble On My Sticky Lips". Franz Ferdinand will always remain and interesting case, it will forever be cool for some to hate them, but anyone who tries to knock this album is lying to themselves, this is a landmark album, a national treasure, and an album of continual delights. From the look, to the album cover, to the closing notes '40 Franz Ferdinand were absolutely perfect. Franz Ferdinand is the sound of a band capturing the zietgiest.

Let's get the obvious criticism of the album out the way straight away. Back To Black on pure musical quality alone is not one of the ten greatest albums of the decade, there are better collections fo 12 tracks out there, and their is no doubt about this, the afore mention Franz Ferdinand for example. However sometimes the strenght, power and story of an album can elevate it to a level above. When it comes to influence this album is unparrelled only the Strokes and Lily Allen come close to having as many imitators, but none can boast such successful imitators (Duffy, V V Brown, Corrine Bailey Rae). This is ultimately what makes Amy so special she is leaps an bounds ahead of her competition. She is a soul singer who has real soul, unlike the plastic bollocks of Duffy who sounds as though she's never had the blues in her life, Amy is legit, and we know it. We've witnessed Amy's self destructive lifestyle, her drug abuse, her choatic and soul destroying relationship with Jail bird boyfriend Blake. So when she sings in her unmistakeably beautiful brassy voice you know this is 100% legit raw emotion and it makes her records have an unbelievably affecting emotional resonance. You get the feeling if Duffy even attempted to someone one tenth of Winehouse's soul she'd end up hanging herself.

It's her tragic tale and beautiful voice that elevate a track like You Know I'm No Good, its so personal, so real and so moving. It's irresistable, were Amy a fake the depth of song writting would be staggering regardless but her story gives her that x factor that tips her over the edge. "Upstairs With My Ex Boy, I'm With Him But I Can't Get Joy...There Be None Of Him No More, I Cry For You On The Kitchen Floor". Her emotional honest and brutal gutsy storytelling, are so refreshingly bluesy and soulful, it feels like a long lost genre that has spent decades being raped for corperate sentiment crying crocadile tears was finally back. The title tracks is another staggering standout as Amy deals with an emotional break up, her partner shrugs it off and goes back to an old girl friend, where as Amy dies inside. Then of course we have Rehab a huge pop single obviously, it has a killer hook, but it's part of a dark story of drug abuse. It's amazing how Amy takes these grueling break ups and these heavy heavy emotional issues and turns them into such goergeously catchy hooks and delicious pre chorus builds, My Tears Dry On My Own is perhaps the best example as the chorus soars "I Cannot Play Myself Again, I Should Just Be My Own Best Friend / Not Fuck Myself In The Head With Stupid Men / He Walks Away / The Sun Goes Down...". As if she needed anymore credibility English Lit students at Cambridge compare those lyrics to Keats and Yates. The arrangements on the album are subtle and sparse, they comes together for the big choruses, but they simmer in the verse; it's Amy's voice that is left to power these tracks forward. Back To Black will forever go down as a classic album, it spawned one of Britian's greatest stars and biggest media spectacles, here's to hoping Amy recovers, because behind the car crash is one of the greatest voices and an unparrelled brutal honest songwritter. An album of unparrelled emotional power.

When Released in 2002 it was hard to imagine just how influencial this record would be. You'd be excused for thinking that Mike Skinner would just be fad, to fade out and be forgotten, or at best "Cult Classic Not Best Seller". However Skinner surpassed his own expectations and became not only a mega star (all be it fleetingly) but a true revolutionary. Mike Skinner wasn't kidding when he wrote "Everything Sounds The Same...Let's Push Things Forward", that's exactly what he did. He instantly rose above the limp UK Garage scene that peaked in 2001 and introduced a new era of social detailing. Britian was plagued by social problems and was still in the heart of binge drinking culture. Skinner reveled in this climate and became the spokesmen for a generation and opened a fascinating window through which the rest of us could view the streets. As Skinner said himself this was "Street Level", simply "A Day In The Life Of A Geezer".

Musically Skinner had all the halmarks of a post UK Garage act the baselines were familar but Skinners arrangements were punchy and sharp, instantly cooler than the competition. Skinner constantly reached for sweeping sharp string arrangements followed up by thudding baselines, the superb "Same Old Thing" sounds urgent and brooding, but when Skinner lays a punchline the musics seeves like the shocking twist of a soap has just been revealed. Geezers Need Excitement is ominous and never settles comfortably and is the perfect accompaniment to the Streets tale of drunken brawls. Tracks like Has It Come To This? sound like antiques now but Skinners' vocals sound as urgent as ever, Skinner has always managed to rap like a drunken stream of conciousness, you can almost feel a hazy thought process when the beat drops and he repeats "Blinded By The Lights, Blinded By The Lights, Brand New Heights". Somehow even weaker a track It's Too Late transports you back to drunken memories of girls, Skinner manages to idealize women even in the most gritty and depressing of settings, it's very touching, and a telling reflection of the male though process.

Then of course there are the anthems (sorry bangers I forgot) and this album was absolutely stacked with hits from top to bottom How Has It Come To This?, Let's Push This Forward, Too Much Brandy, Weak Become Heroes and Don't Mug Yourself. Then of course there's the delicious satire of The Irony Of It All, a razor sharp critique of the governments drug control policy. However the undoubted highlights are the afforementioned Don't Mug Yourself an unstoppable club banger and the superb Weak Become Heroes the closest thing to a ballad on display, it's heartfelt, honest and real. The Streets may have slumped considerably but Original Pirate Material was an album that shaped a decade it's hard to imagine the Arctic Monkeys or Lily Allen without Mike Skinner. British music in 2009 would be completely unrecognizable were it not for the pioneering Original Pirate Material, a record that kicked down a door and started a revolution.

Kid A and Amnesiac saw Radiohead pushing boundaries rejecting their role as a traditional guitar band and distancing themselves from the world concuring OK Computer. Hail To The Thief was unsettled, it showed Radiohead as jack of all trades without identity and lacking a conherent sound. In Rainbows was the sound of a band coming to terms with themselves, consolidating their sound and becoming happy with themselves. That doesn't sound to exciting does it? But it was, it was thrilling, it was what fans wanted, its what the band wanted, they had evolved into Radiohead 2.0, the infulences of Kid A were apparent, but they'd also accepted the Radiohead that made OK Computer and The Bends. We had the Radiohead sound, this was distinctively Radiohead, it was just right, everything was in its right place.

Of course this album is famous for a reason that has nothing to do with how fucking fantastic this album sounds. This album saw Radiohead break from Parlephone, they were no longer to be dictated to, unfortunately the Studio would get their moneys worth with a heartless Best of but Radiohead were free. Radiohead were always trend setters, and in 2007 they shook the music world to its core. They released there album online, and they were going to let their fans choose what they wanted to pay for it. Shock horror, it's the apocalypse, or at least that's what the press and the music industry said, of course it wasn't. Radiohead were simply pushing the boundaries and embracing the new media. I paid 7.99 for this album, the same price as it would cost on itunes. It turns out as the band made 100% of the profit they reeped in huge sums reportedly £5 a download (with huge numbers, and a 40 boxset too that sold out). The album awesomeness spread and the regular retail release went straight to number one as well and stayed in the charts for most the of the year. Radiohead had put the whole record industry on the back foot, again suprised everyone, and had made a packet.

That is only half the story. The album itself was sublime from the skipping eltro beats of 15 Step and the millenium bug crackle of the fragile Videotape you could see the influence of Kid A now absorbed down into lovely three minute tracks. Then there was Nude ten years in the making a ballad so beautiful, so tender it became a classic of the highest order on first listen. Nude kicked off a series of three staggering ballads that we're remarkable in their beauty, subtly arrangement they felt like floating through space, first Weird Fishes with its skippy jazzy drums and then the wonderful stripped down and raw All I Need. A song so haunting a tender it sit side by side with Pryamid Song, yet while it brought back memories of Amnesiac it was so now, it couldn't be anywhere but on In Rainbows. Lyrically Thom was as cutting as ever "I'm An Animal / Trapped In Your Hot Car / I Am All The Days / That You Choose To Ignore" his imagery was sinister and pitched to perfection.

This album had all Radiohead's talents on display and fitting together so comfortably, next to the ballads we had the heir to danceable discendant of Idioteque; 15 Step, the visceral wrath of Body Snatchers, the radio friendly sing along A Jigsaw Falling Into Place. Every track on this album is superb, only Videotape feels like a hang over from Hail To The Thief but the beauty of the ballad means it is far from unwelcome. Radiohead did it again, they reinvented the wheel and shocked the world while at the sametime releasing their most conventional, accesible and beautiful album since OK Computer. Radiohead proved their as vital today as they were ten years ago. An Instant Classic.

James Murphy clearly wasn't happy proving that he had the coolest record collection on earth, and proving that he was the coolest DJ on earth, above any scene or trend, he was constant. No now he had to make having a mid life crisis cool. Yes you read that corectly, he was coming to terms with his age, his friends, his life, his status, he was all depressed and serious and he was of course going to nonchalantly make the best record of the year. The thing that makes Murphy and by extension Sound Of Silver so great is that he can delve into the past, seek influences from rock and dance, and various legends and sound so remarkably fresh. While New York I Love You may sound more than a little reminiscant of the Velvet Underground and Bowie, it never feels indepted, it feels like more, and evolution and new creature, vital, and urgent. Get Innocuous! is a sublime example you can hear Bowie again and of course Eno and pinches of Kraftwerk but it sounds so different and timeless, you can identify point A but how the hell Murphy got to point Z is beyond explanation.

If we think back to the LCD's debut album LCD Soundsystem it was dripping with cool, sounded like a million bucks but it felt a little souless, it sounded cool, but you felt Murphy had nothing to say and not much of a voice to convey it with. On Sound Of Silver those question marks have been blasted into out of space, Someone Great is staggeringly emotive, full of great trusism ("I Wish That We Could Talk About It / But Then That's The Problem") but it's opaque hard to penetrate and remains as fascinating on 50th listen as it was on the first. Murphy's voice that before seemed concerned with being cool, the unapproachably apathetic party host, is now tender, a sort of hushed depressive tone, the tone of a man feeling low, who can't quite conjure the words to say what he means, so the thoughts just neurotically swirl in his head. Of course after the charming Someone Great comes the superb All My Friends one of the bravest and most powerful singles in recent memory, it's emotive, and Murphy's voice is perfect, his fragile tone is just right. Musically the tracks are arranged superbly the grow and morph to the perfect conclusion, it so organic, it's remarkable that cold harsh electro could ever be this moving.

All this talk of emotion, depression and midlife crisis probably has you worried, after all this is James Murphy and LCD Soundsystem, we demand club bangers, and tracks to make us dance until our feet bleed. Murphy delivers in spades, his trademark yelp and stomp are present on the deliciously satirical North American Scum. Then there's the hypnotic chanting of Watch The Tapes and the burbling subversive irrestibility of Get Innocuous! Then there's the eighties grooveathon of Sound Of Silver which continues the midlife crisis theme while giving you a finger lickingly good bass line. All in all there isn't really a weak track on this album, it flows from place to place, it's never predictable, there's a hell of alot of artistry gone into creating these intricately laid grooves and beats. Murphy now stands without critics, he can be the coolest kid at the party, while also being the most serious and soulful, its an incredible achievement, and puts Sound Of Silver in a class of its own.

Sometimes you wish that you'd just discovered an album. You know when you see a review or see a website and give a band a try just because, and then they stun you, blow you away, you wonder how you ever managed to live without them. It always feels better when you're genuinely suprised by a bands brilliance, it's never quite the same when you've had months of being told a record was great, that you have to own it and then you hear it. I'm the worlds biggest Strokes fan (literally), and even though I loved their debut after all the hype on first listen I couldn't help but ask myself Is This It? Of course in the Strokes case that was by design but it happens so often, the hype always undermines the joy of the first listen. Therefore when it came time to listen to Funeral after a plethora of five star reviews, non stop hype in the magazines and in the broadsheets, not only did they have indie and art creditibility, U friggin 2 took them as support on world tour, an impossibly high bar was set. Yet when the first violin jab, piano line and guitar crunch of Neighbourhood #1 (Tunnels) sounded I was blown away, implausible caught by complete and utter suprise. The arrangments were so captivating and ellequent, and Win Butler carried such raw emotive desperation in his voice, it left me completely speechless.

Funeral is such a dense album, its full of little hidden suprises, coming back to it some five years after my first listen I find subtle touches hidden away in even the most over played of songs, I had honetly never noticed the delightful triangle on Neighbourhood #3 (Powers Out). Which remains an amazing single, a track so cleverly crafted, so powerful, it doesn't aim to make you dance or sing along this is music that's made to move you, yes move you deep inside. It's staggering, the fact that this was a huge selling single makes it even more of a delight. The consistancy of the album is staggering, with so many instruments on display there's always a tendency for bands to over do it or for sloppy arrangements to accomidate a multi talented band at the expense of song structure but Arcade Fire never make that mistake, their arrangements are always right on the money.

This album is a remarkable array of contradictions it has huge sweeping widescreen arrangements that could fill whole feilds or movie screens there so epic, yet at the same time, it feels small organic, homely, like your in Win Butler's little Canadian Neighbourhood. They manage to come across as subtle and complex, densely layered and yet sparse, heartfelt and uplifting but equally tragic and heartbreaking. They have songs for every occasion the epic Wake Up has filled huge festivals from Glastonbury to Tokyo and then there's the tragically short, fragile and honest Crown Of Love (my favorite song, although that changes with each passing track). Funeral truly is a timeless album, it doesn't connect itself to any trends or temporal landmarks, had I been told this record had been released in 1954 I'd of believed you, Funeral is purely and simply timeless genius.

It was a really tough call but I've stuck with my gut feeling and placed Arctic Monkeys just ahead of Arcade Fire. It was such a tough choice because it was a choice between a timeless classic of grace and beauty and a historical document, a record that could only have been made in the noughties, could only have come from Great Britian. When the Andrew Marr's of the future (hey maybe it'll be me) come to write their histories of Modern Britian the sound track to the chapter on 2000-2009 will be Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not. This is an album that every person in Great Britain can relate to, even if they have to stretch their memories a little. This is the story of a night out, on a weekend, it's gritty urban storyline, it's drinking in the streets, dealing with nasty bouncers, asbos, taxi cabs, kebabs, vomit, pulling, romance, if your ages 15-30 this is your life.

A Certain Romance remains the albums standout and the Arctic Monkey's epic, the songwriting peak that will close their sets from now till the day they hang up the guitars, even though it was never released as a single. I can see it now, a documentary in twenty years time, some clips of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, then a non discript city centre with people filmed on CCTV binge drinking and falling out of a walkabout and a harsh narrators tone as Alex Turner croons "There Ain't No Romance". Turner has a sublime turn of phrase that sums up seemingly everything about modern life "There's Only Music So That There's New Ringtones". Turner taps into the mindset of every bloke "on the pull" in a nightclub in the awesome Dancing Shoes "The Only Reason That You Came / So What You Scared For?", the theme is continued on Still Take You Home where Turner buries modern women tarted up ("Your Just Probably Alright But Under These Lights You Look Beautiful / I Can't See Through Your Fake Tan"), completely buries modern top shop scenester culture ("Your A Fad / Your A Fashion / A Top Shop Princess / A Rockstar Too") but then for all his cynicism he admits he's no better because after all "I'd Still Take Home...And You've Got Control of Everyones Eyes Including Mine".

It's the brutal honesty that makes Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not so affecting, it pulls no punches, unlike the Libertines there's no bullshit visions of lovely old Albion with fair madions skipping around Camdem town and swooning when a gentlemen dofs his cap. No the Arctic Monkeys present a view of Britian with Riot Vans, under age drinking and kids "scrapping with pool cues in their hands". Of course all this would be fruitless if the music couldn't match Turner's tongue but the guitars trash, the baselines bounce and every track on display is tight, urgent and vital. Everysong on this album could have been released as a single, its consistancy is remarkable, the album is well ordered and flows beautiful to its sublime aforemention end note. This album made Arctic Monkeys superstars but more importantly it will be more powerful and more relevant than any newsreel footage, or history book, this is living breathing social history.

"You have balls.....I Like Balls", yes I did just quote Team America in a music review, but it's entirely relevant because in the year 2000 Thom Yorke and Radiohead and the biggest balls in the world, seriously they must have been the size of Bowling Balls. I'm still staggered when I listen to it now that Parlephone didn't tell Thom to go back to the study and record the album all over again. Remember all that worry about the Millenium bug, and how all the computers would break down and chaos would ensue. Well that's exactly what Kid A sounds like, when listening to Everything In It's Right Place (still my favorite album opener of all time), it sounds like the apolocalypse has come, that all the computers are breaking down and melting in your ears. It's deathly cold, and scary as hell, it feels sparse and spacious like there's no one around like you've been dumbed on the haunting glacier of the album artwork. Thom croons in a skipping and staggering beat that Everthing is in it's right place, but it isn't, he knows it, you know it, but while it may be wrong it begins to feel right and you become engrossed in this haunted neo acopaclyptic dream, like a ghostly conciousness stuck inside the machine.

National Anthem then comes in and those of you who were still recovering from the mind fuck of Kid A are probably thanking your lucky stars for an irresistable guitar hook, phew my computer is okay again. Unfortunately for you no it isn't, but luckily for the rest of us the boundaries are about to be pushed to their limmits, we get these specteral coos, like spirits rushing across a frozen glaciar in out of space, there utterly terrifying but strangly beautiful. Then Thom Yorke's voice comes in all managled by the machine, but he sings so beautiful, like the last utterings of a dead soul caught in an evil computer memory bank. Radiohead clevely let the vocoder trail off leaving us a second of Thom's gorgoeus vocal at the end of each line. Then in true A Day In The Life fashion, a lovely horn comes in, but it turns from a horn, into a thousand horns sounding at once, out of tune and out of time, it's a mamoth conclusion to a mind bending track.

I just dedicated a whole paragraph to a single track but it's utterly neccesary, becuase the tracks on this album challenge you, they throw these uncomfortable but beautiful arrangements at you, they never quite sit still, you have to go with them from place to place they take you on a journey. Even a simple ballad like the tragic How To Dissapear Completely are goregously arranged, with haunting echoes and soaring strings and float between a dream and a brooding nightmare like a feather caught in the wind. Then of course there's Optimistic and the fucking fantastic (sorry to be crude but it is) Idioteque, the beats are amazing, it's ah, so bloody good. There is so much to admire and decifer on this album its a tough nut to crack but even if you have to whack it repeatedly with a sledgehammer its worth it. "Getting" this album is an important part of every music lovers development, when I first heard it I gave it Three and a half out of five, but now I can't believe I was so foolish, this is a landmark album, it represents an evolved palate, and a deeper understanding of music. It pushes boundaries, it's uncomfortable, it tries to scare you off, but at it's core is a beautiful child that just wants to be loved.

I'm going to regret this for the rest of my life (or at least until December when I do my refiddle), but somehow I've managed to put my favorite album of all time, the most important album to me culturally, the most important album to music in the twentieth first century, arguable the most influencial ever, seriously look at any musical landscape and you'll find it hard to find an album that had a more immediate effect (one which is still felt ten years on) than this. Yes I've put it second, I have my reasons, probably stupid reasons, but my desire to throw a curb ball has won out and the mighty Is This It has come in second. Let's start with the influence, I've reviewed this album several times but I never get tired of doing it, because I owe it a great debt of gratitude. Do you remember music prior to this album? Do you? Well I bloody well do because I grew up before this album changed the musical landscapes. The charts were dominated by Limp Bizkit, Korn, Linkin Park, shit period Metallica if you liked hard rock, if you liked Indy Blur had gone all experimental and it wasn't cool to like them, Oasis were complete horseshit, Britpop was dead (thankfully) and you basically had the choice of Athlete, Staind or Travis. Pop was pretty awful too we had S Club Seven, Steps, Britney before she went mental and cool, Usher, pre sexed up Christina Augillara and general crap. Seriously rap metal was cool, but thank god for Is This It because it killed all of that shit dead! Everything changed, it had too, in a word The Strokes reinvented being cool.

Now this sounds like ludicriously over the top praise, but is it really? Think about it imagine before the Strokes think about how people dressed, you had the punk hair cuts, shity clothes, and white boy dreadlocks of the rap-rock era, you still had the lad rock hang over with flip flops and a football shirt and then of course there was the Travis look. After The Strokes appeared looking (and sounding) like the bastard offspring of the Velvet Underground and the Ramones in a Armani advert. Suddenly everyone started wearing converse, skinny jeans, designer hair cuts, cool jackets, just look at a picture of the Strokes in 2000 and then walk down your nearest high street, Toni and Guy stay in business by making you look like the Strokes. Even Doctor Who is post Strokes. Then there's the music, after Is This It guitars started out selling decks, New York became the world capital for cool, The US started having Indie bands again, every band today sounds like or openly sites (see Arctic Monkeys) the Strokes as their biggest influences. This album got a whole generation myself included into music, and more specifically into rock music. Even Busted and McFly and Britney suddenly needed guitars to be credible.

Then there's the music. The usual band math says Television + Velvet Underground + Ramones = Strokes, and to a certain extent that's true. The Strokes didn't reinvent the wheel, they didn't push boundaries, they reminded us how rock used to be, how it used to look, and reminded us all why we feel in love with guitar music in the first place. Wanking off on guitar, that was gone, ten minute tracks, no way, crying your eyes out, no way. This was short sharp tight rock and roll, it was the new musical minimalism, everything had a purpose, any potential fat was trimmed, it was thirty two minutes of perfect rock and roll. Every song on the album could be have been a single, people still debate the tragedy that Take It Or Leave It, Soma, New York City Cops or whatever your favorite is never got a release. The absolute best thing about the Strokes was the nonchalance, this album was so indie, it sounds like it's recorded in a skip, it has no pretence, no granduer, just dirty rock and roll. The opener Is This It sums up the album, a short sharp track sung with complete apathy, they seemed bored with there own super hype as Julian drooled "Is...This....It?".

There was of course one criticism, that Julian Casablancas has absolutely nothing to say, he just sings about chasing girls and has no serious insight to offer, no life creedos, but I think Nicky Wire summed it up best on MTV when he said, The Strokes have absolutely nothing to say, and they say everything about there generation. Ultimately The Strokes were never the hard workers, they were always the laziest band in show business, they were so apathetical, they just didn't care, they came to make music, and that's what they did. They never would be Kings Of Leon or the Killers they weren't here to concour the world, they were just here to set us all back on the right course. If ever you doubt the importance of Is This It simply search your itunes and playing Rollin' or Why Does It Always Rain on Me or any of the garbage we had to endure back in those dark dark days. So Is This It? Yeah it is, eleven three minute rock songs, that saved the world.