The Singles Jukebox

Fair to say we have some issues with these boys…

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[3.75]

Hillary Brown: More than a decade on, they haven’t gotten any less boring.
[4]

David Raposa: “Estuary / won’t you take me” — they still got it! I’m resigned to the fact that these dudes (RIP Carlos D) are perfectly happy to sit in their little mid-tempo post-punk niche, forever adjusting that one picture frame that may or may not be crooked. This is one of their better takes on reinventing that particular go-nowhere wheel (as my score suggests), but I’m the sort of business-casual faux-Goth that actually gives their 3rd album an on-purpose listen from time to time, so adjust your expectations accordingly.
[7]

Alfred Soto: For their fourth album Notorious, Duran Duran hired Nile Rodgers and the Borneo Horns to enliven half-written tracks. The lead single boasted the line “Don’t monkey with my business.” For their fourth album Interpol didn’t call Nile Rodgers, and there isn’t a horn in sight. The lead single boasts the lines, “Please police me/I want you to PO-lice me but keep it clean.” If slower and longer signifies maturity, I wonder what they’ll call their work when one or more of them joins Alcoholics Anonymous.
[2]

Martin Skidmore: If you took the bassline from Black Sabbath’s “Iron Man” and gave it to a band in thrall to Joy Division, this is roughly what you would get. I liked Joy Division, but I don’t think they’re a good template at all, and Interpol have none of their sinister power, however much they ramp up the volume as this goes on.
[2]

Michael Waters: It starts out resembling someone doing David Bowie on Stars in Their Eyes, until it gets dragged through a car wash into the 21st Century by sterile drums and guitars so inoffensive and nondescript I almost forgot to write about how inoffensive and nondescript they are.
[5]

Jonathan Bogart: Joy Division comparisons have long since outlived their usefulness. The Church comparisons, on the other hand…
[5]

Mallory O’Donnell: Interpol will always know how to manage an atmosphere well enough that they can afford to do silly things. Like try their hardest at an Ozzy-style whiskey & weed vocal intro. Like stress a corny reference to their name (“police me / I want you to po-lice me / but keep it clean”) so obviously it almost becomes cute. Like make a tactically adequate R.E.M. song that pops out of the middle (~3:25) of a what is outwardly nothing more than a really long bridge. Like serve as a handy reminder that The Moody Blues will always be more important and influential than Pink Floyd.
[4]

Michaelangelo Matos: People are so fucking dumb.
[1]