Oh my god. Hi everyone, Roughthony Onetano here, the internet's busiest music nerd, and it's time for a review of this new The Strokes album, Reality Awaits.

Here we have the newest and seventh full-length LP from legendary New York indie veterans, The Strokes, a band that, honestly, has it all. Classic records and songs that have sold millions. An influential sound. An Italian drummer. And also a large and impassioned fanbase that has ridden with the band through multiple eras, hiatuses, side projects, solo efforts, harebrained experiments, and everything in between.

And The Strokes have also proven to have something many of their oughties indie contemporaries haven't, and that is longevity. Because while the band's catalog has certainly had its share of highs and lows, many would argue their last album, The New Abnormal, is handily one of their best, and came over 20 years after their debut record.

It was a daring and fun album produced by the one and only Rick Rubin. And this one really saw the band going off the rails, challenging fans with longer songs, some synth-pop and new-wave influences, messy mixes, and some chaotic psychedelic layers, too. And with all of that, the band was somehow still nailing it with one of their best crops of songs in years. And for people who have been waiting for the band to drop something at least on the level of Room on Fire, this album was cause for celebration. Not only were The Strokes back, but they were back in rare form.

But the period immediately following this record wasn't nearly as focused or as permanent as many had hoped for. News of another album was nowhere in sight. Meanwhile, various members respectively retreated into their own creative outlets. Albert Hammond Jr. put out some solo work in 2024, which was the same year that Julian reconvened with his other band, The Voidz, and did so with a strange album that left a sour taste in many fans' mouths: Like All Before You, whose release was maybe doomed from the start due to the album cover, I guess, being AI-generated.

But the music itself wasn't helping either, as the production and performances on this one felt very isolated in comparison with previous Voidz albums. It was almost as if Julian had conceived and tracked this one all on his own, with many of the songs having not only a demo-quality presentation but also weak songwriting on nearly every track, and some heavy-handed use of autotune as well.

I mean, not only was this a step down from everything The Voidz had been up until this point, but also anything Julian had ever done solo or otherwise. However, with that being said, The Voidz and The Strokes are very different bands, that is true. Still, it's a band whose trajectory is difficult to ignore in this context, especially since historically Julian is bad at compartmentalizing random artistic urges.

Because what creative juices tend to be flowing into orbiting creative outlets are typically likely to make it onto any number of Strokes tracks as well. And given how great The New Abnormal came out, that's not innately a bad thing. But with that being said, I was wondering what state this album would be delivered in once its backstory was laid out, as The Strokes once again are working with Rick Rubin on this one.

Apparently they had some initial sessions in Costa Rica laying this album down, and then apparently pieced the rest of it together by essentially recording other bits and odds and ends in random places, at random times. Eventually, we began to get initial singles, like "Going Shopping," which honestly had a lot to like between its dancey drums and slick rhythm guitars. Julian's lyrics on this one are pretty on point, too. The whole thing kind of boils down to a single line with him saying, "The worse reality gets, the less you want to hear about it." It's a track that is very much about escapism, but then also having these feelings of isolation that are felt after running away from all the madness and chaos of the world and people.

The issue, though, that I and many had with this track upon its release, is that it is just absolutely slathered in autotune, like an abusive amount of it. And look, in the greater context of The Strokes and Julian's music career, he is no stranger to autotune or some pitch correction. He has used it many a time, sometimes quite successfully, like on "Instant Crush" with Daft Punk, or the various vocal manipulations and effects that you can hear on the 2011 Strokes album Angles, which I would argue is kind of like one of the selling points of the album. And while this sort of thing doesn't always lead to a perfect result for Julian and the band, at the very least when they head in this direction it feels purposeful, intentional, daring, a little bit different.

However, I can't say the same for "Going Shopping," which features some solid writing for sure, but at its core it feels kind of like an average Strokes song, more or less. But then it's just randomly topped with autotune, like Rick and the band decided to set it and forget it, ignoring all of the notes that get thrown in that sound out of place or out of key as Julian is kind of loosely veering from note to note. A characteristic about his delivery that's actually pretty cool and charming when you were hearing his vocal performances in the raw, but that characteristic is lost when the autotune is applied in a way that makes Julian's singing sound more rigid or melodically locked into a grid, which is a shame because, again, at its core, I don't think this is a bad track at all.

Of course, The Strokes going this direction left fans wondering how much autotune might end up being on this album, and that question was pretty much answered by the second single on the record, "Falling Out of Love," which is a ballad, a pretty emotional one at that, one with very slow, dreamy guitars, numerous falsetto runs from Julian too. Overall, it's a very gentle and nuanced sound from the band, one that could most definitely use a vocal that's maybe soft or pillowy or sweet and intimate.

Nope! Sorry! You're gonna get hot, spicy shots of autotune right in your ear instead. It's like sonic pepper spray over prom night chord progressions. Even the damn spoken word passages on the song are autotuned. After this track, I think most had kind of accepted their fate with this record, like this was going to be The Strokes' autotune album. And by that, I don't mean the band would only be using autotune for every track, because, in fact, they actually aren't. What I mean by that is autotune would be the only defining element of the record that would make it feel novel or interesting, with respect to every other Strokes project.

Because it's not like the band and Julian Casablancus haven't made experimental music before. They most certainly have, and there are probably contexts in which autotune within the band would make sense or even be called for, but that is not the instrumental palette of this record. Much of the time, a lot of the production on this album and the guitar work, the drums, are pretty average for The Strokes, and really would be unremarkable if not for Julian topping them with this autotune, and just pushing it so hard to the point where he sounds like a pitch-corrected alien.

So yeah, again, worst fears were pretty much confirmed with the release of the album. And I don't just mean its use of vocal effects, but also its overall lack of inspiration, because it doesn't feel like the band has any new or refreshing ideas in the tank at this point. And what decent songs are here are, again, just slathered in the autotune. Take the song "Psycho Shit," for example, which is a very dramatic and dynamic start to the record. Love the chord progression. Love the progressive intensity of it. I also love Albert's lead guitar work in the last leg of the song, too.

But of course, the autotune is there, and it does not lend itself to the very theatrical performance Julian is trying to give, and it doesn't really work with the deep vibrato he's trying to sing with that pulls him in and out of the note. The autotune doesn't really know where he wants to be. It's especially frustrating because behind the autotune, you can hear the performance Julian is giving is actually not that bad at all. And it just makes me wonder what this plug-in is supposed to be bringing to the table on this track.

Personally, I would argue it's bringing nothing, or rather, taking away from the song. But on the following "Dine N'Dash," the autotune is off. In fact, the instrumentation and writing on this track kind of takes me back to the New Abnormal era. There's a lot of familiar Strokesisms on this track, but coming across kind of grim or dark. You have droning synth layers on this track, guitar work that has almost like a goth flavor to it, and Julian switching off between these kind of standoffish croons and gruff screams. I mean, it's great for this album, but I'm not even sure this would be, like, a top three track on The New Abnormal, or a top five for that matter.

Then there's "Lonely in the Future," another moment that at its core feels like a standard Strokes song of sorts, with groovy rock beats, sleek rhythm guitars, Julian's trademark brand of baritone swagger, kind of sounding like an indie lounge singer. But once again, you have the autotune, which I would argue in the case of this song doesn't entirely ruin it. It's kind of like a straightforward indie pop-rock cut where Julian's not trying to do too much dramatically, too much vibrato. The performance is pretty straightforward, which I think plays into the effect.

A bigger issue is kind of the lyrics feeling almost like a bit of a lost opportunity. The bulk of the song is devoted to this idea that he's kind of ahead of the curve culturally in various ways, and lists off a handful of different figures that he's kind of like beat to the punch. But this in itself is kind of a weird argument to be making on this record. Because, again, did you not just do an AI art album cover on that last Voidz record? Was that being ahead of the curve?

And also, again, the only novel thing about this new album here is that it's slathered in an effect that is older than the band itself, and had, like, its big mainstream introduction back in 1998 or so. So what's ahead of the curve about that? Still, even so, Julian makes the argument that he didn't want to do X or Y or Z yesterday, but he did. And interestingly, I am also named among the many figures who he heard this or that before, did this or that before. With Julian saying that, yes, he heard stuff 20 years ago when he was a kid, when he was 27. Ha ha ha! Yes, the tender childhood age of 27.

But yeah, saying you were onto music or musical ideas before someone who you're almost 10 years older than is not really a flex. I'm sure right now there's 15-year-olds forming music opinions that I might have had around that age. It doesn't mean they don't have valid perspectives or can't recognize art. But as silly as this commentary is, I'm more offended by the bridge of this track, because what the fuck are these synthesizers? They sound like ass. They sound like they were EQ'd on an ass. Or a Bluetooth speaker that was lodged in an ass.

And just when I thought I was done with this song, I get some déjà vu on "Going to Babble On," which, why does this feel like I'm listening to a chord progression similar to that of "Lonely in the Future" again? I swear, there are parts of this track where you could sing Julian's chorus over it, but just slower and it works. But now he's singing the track with no autotune and doing what sounds like a Jamiroquai impression.

I mean, at least the vocals are raw and sound pretty good. But it's kind of like the band went into the studio with a limited amount of tunes and just decided to do a slower and more vaguely sexy version of the same musical idea, and then just put different lyrics on it. But then as we move into the final leg of the album, we have "Liar's Remorse," which, judging from the chords and melodies on this track, this is kind of like The Strokes' "Hotel California." Or maybe it's their "I Will Survive." Or maybe it's both, but worse.

Whatever it's borrowing from, it does have a pretty compelling set of chords to it and a vocal melody. But like many tracks off that last Voidz album, even if there are decent bones there and good intentions, none of it ever really develops or builds up in anything that is a payoff of any sort, to all this tension that's being built up. I mean, maybe it would be a bit more worth it if we were being given some sonic experiments on the level of Angles or even, The Voidz' Human Sadness.

Then with "The Fruits of Conquest," we are suddenly getting funky with hip-shaking guitars and even hand drums. And these are elements I could see myself enjoying in another context. In fact, I know that's true because, in a lot of ways, this track just sounds like a Cake song. A Cake song where the vocals and lyrics are severely phoned in. Again, love that The Strokes and their fans are pitching this record as the band zigging when everyone thought they would zag, when they're literally just making Cake-sounding pop rock with Julian goofing off on the bridge singing, "I'm a leech, I'm a leech, I'm a leech."

The closing track, "Tyrants of the Mellow Moon," is yet another slow burner with way too damn much autotune on it, I am sorry. Like the intro track, it has a lot of nuance to it – dramatic chords, slow progression – but Julian's vocals just sound like trash. There are some elements of its writing, especially toward the very end, that feels almost like a reprise or a callback to some musical motifs from earlier on the album, especially at the start. That is a well-intentioned idea, but I think that would have gone over better on an album that, again, didn't feel so messy and thrown together, and so haphazard in its structuring, in its mixing, in its use of effects.

But yeah, this album kind of stinks, and I think it's The Strokes' worst album yet, far worse than Comedown Machine. In fact, it makes Comedown Machine sound great. I'm actually sort of nostalgic for Comedown Machine after listening to this record. But as strongly as I feel about this album in the way that I do, and feeling this way as a longtime Strokes fan, somebody who's been fucking with the band's music since their debut album, I'm sad and a little worried that Julian's decision to mention me in the lyrics of this record will leave a lot of desperate losers feeling like, "Oh, well, he just doesn't like the album because he was mentioned, and he would've liked it if he wasn't."

When, honestly, this record is not that far of a cry away in quality to that Voidz album that I smashed to bits in a review. This over here is a little bit better, but honestly not by much. It really does feel like, on some level, Julian was trying to poison the well here and make it seem like no matter what I say about this record, his comments about me are going to be impacting this review. When, in reality, prior to the release of this record, we have a very similar-sounding example that I said sucked, and then following that, we have another similar-sounding album that sucks a bit less, but still sucks all the same.

Which is why I'm feeling a decent to strong 3 on this one.

Anthony Fantano. The Strokes. Forever.