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![]() interpol interview and live exclusive
Calling Interpol. "After the first record it was, 'They sound just like Joy Division.' On the second record it was, 'It's a sophomore slump.' This record they'll probably say, 'It's a tertiary slump.' Then on the fourth album, we'll just be old and outdated. We're never going to win." Dandyish Interpol bassist Carlos Dengler is tongue-in-cheekily recalling some of the critical snipes aimed at his band with the amused good nature of a man who quietly knows just how far off the mark the naysayers are. Of course, Turn On The Bright Lights, Interpol's debut, was actually bigger, bolder and more beautiful than any Joy Division album; the sequel, Antics, successfully took a rougher, rockier route to angsty nirvana, and now new album Our Love To Admire offers the best of both worlds: sad, sweeping songs revved up on danger, pace and white-hot drama. ![]() "It was a hell of a lot easier to make than the second record," says Carlos, quashing those rumours about Our Love To Admire's supposedly tempestuous birth. "I mean, a second album is a total make-or-break thing. Wobbly second albums kill the careers of so many bands stone dead. But this time around…" "This time around, we had the luxury of time," interjects smoky drummer Sam Fogarino. "We didn't have anybody sticking their heads around the studio door, we parted ways with our management, and the noose of business and commerce was removed from our necks. There was nobody applying pressure on this record except ourselves." ![]() Left to their own devices, Interpol have fashioned one of the year's most stirring releases. From slow-building opener Pioneer To The Falls to disarming cocaine confessional Rest My Chemistry, it's a record that soars with the epic headiness of a grand Teutonic opera. "Sturm und drang," grins Carlos, rolling the phrase (trans: 'storm and stress') around his mouth. "That's how I like to think of this album. It's that feel of late 19th-century German symphonic music. All that fanning of existential flames; a grand evocation of spiritual forces." Matching the melodies for weight are Paul Banks' lyrics: melancholy meditations on relationships and their pitfalls, all delivered in that haunted and baroque semi-monotone. "I'll be honest, we don't always know exactly what Paul means with his lyrics," admits Carlos, "but, y'know, we trust him. He has said that a lot of his lyrics are about the tensions, sexual and otherwise, that exist between men and women. And that's something everyone can relate to." Sexual politics, existential angst and riffs that could induce a lunar eclipse. It's great to have Interpol back, isn't it?
Joe Madden
Interpol – Our Love To Admire, released 16 July 07 on Parlophone.
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