Is This It

Product Information

The booklet insert contains stylized separate portraits of the Strokes, Raphael, Gentles, and Bowersock, all photographed by Lane. The US CD version of the album replaced "New York City Cops" with a newly recorded song, "When It Started", while the vinyl edition retained the original track list. The studio is located in a basement with poor lighting, but despite its poor infrastructure, it includes modern Pro Tools digital audio workstation hardware. Gentles quit his job to manage the band full-time and, in March 2001, the Strokes signed to RCA Records after a protracted bidding war.

Two years later we made the move to our present address, 35 The Headrow, where we have remained ever since. Valensi commented that guitar teacher and mentor Bowersock was invaluable because he was articulating things to the producer that the group could not.

Like "Soma", "Hard to Explain" contains processed drum tracks using dynamic range compression and equalization studio techniques to make them sound like a drum machine. This was the first vinyl I ever bought alongside Room on Fire at the Rock N Roll Hall of Fame during a trip in 2010. In the US, Is This It entered the Billboard200 at number74 after selling 16,000units in the first week. At its core, there are reggae-inspired rhythm guitar lines played by Hammond, and studio noise effects. The RCA Records label is a unit of BMG Entertainment TMK(S) ® registered | Marcas registrada(s) [RCA logo] ® General Electric Co.

There's a lot of people here in America who think we've had it too easy, but they have never really heard the music.

The producer and the band were given complete control only when Casablancas persuaded the delegate by playing him some of the new material on a boom box. The mixture of raise-the-roof indie, real life lyrics and superb instrumentation combine for what is a really special, once in a generation album. In his favorable A− review, David Browne of Entertainment Weekly conceded that he did not know whether the Strokes would have a long-term impact, but noted that, at the time, the record "just feels right, and sometimes that's enough". According to the band's manager, the frontman phoned him before the Japan and Europe release and said, "I found something even cooler than the ass picture.

By October 2003, the record had spent 58weeks on the Billboard200 since its release two years earlier, selling 900,000copies in America; two million copies were sold worldwide. For their debut, the band strived to capture a simple sound that was not significantly enhanced in the studio. Casablancas's stepfather and Moretti's and Fraiture's older brothers introduced the quartet to the music of reggae artist Bob Marley, protopunk group the Velvet Underground, and alternative rock band Jane's Addiction. RCA product manager Dave Gottlieb commented that "it was straight up a band decision", while Gentles indicated that Casablancas had wanted it to appear globally.

Inspired by the Velvet Underground's production and the direct approach of punk rock band Ramones, the miking scheme for the drum kit included only three microphones: one above it, one for the bass drum, and one in the corner of the studio. After the deal with RCA, the Strokes started working with Gil Norton, who had produced recordings for alternative rock group Pixies.