Interpol - Turn On The Bright Lights [Half Speed Remastered]

The 2022 half-speed mastered vinyl reissue of Interpol's Turn On The Bright Lights (released for the 20th anniversary) generally receives positive feedback for its audio quality, focusing on a clearer, more spacious presentation of the seminal 2002 post-punk album. The half-speed mastering process (often done at Abbey Road) typically aims for better high-frequency response and tighter stereo imagery. Listeners often report that this version feels "less compressed" and "more dynamic" compared to some earlier, louder pressings. Reviews suggest the remastering is "mercifully faithful to the original" mix, preserving the raw, basement-rehearsal atmosphere rather than trying to polish it into a modern, slick pop record. The separation between the instruments—particularly the distinctive, interweaving guitar lines of Daniel Kessler and Sam Fogarino’s rhythmic drumming—is often noted as a highlight, allowing the "dark, squalling guitars" to pop. The album itself is regarded as a modern classic, and the half-speed remaster is generally considered the best way to experience it on vinyl for its balance of raw intensity and sonic detail. It is recommended for fans wanting a superior sonic experience on vinyl, even if they already own the original, though it is described by some as "pricey".

Reviewed By Eric Carr August 18, 2002

As you read this, there are likely a number of people in your midst summoning up all the backlash powers their mortal frames can bear, those who believe the boys from Interpol to be the latest shock troops in the battle of PR style over artistic substance. And who can blame them? After the veritable shitstorm of publicity drummed up by a certain New York City band-- one that had the audacity to not be the denim-clad messiahs of rock and roll we'd been promised-- directing a little skepticism toward NYC's buzzmongers is probably healthy. Plus, at a glance, Interpol's snazzy suits and expensive haircuts seem symptomatic of a carefully spun image designed purely to separate money from wallets. It's okay to be suspicious.

But back up. These guys are on Matador, not RCA. The hypester division of Matador is a guy in a closet (and he's only part-time); the 'spin' budget for Interpol wouldn't even be a down-payment on Julian Casablancas' designer leather jacket. The fact that these guys see press at all can only be attributed to their die-hard contingent of fans (I'm only recently converted), and was earned purely through legwork and a handful of underpublicised EPs. And now that they've won our attention, after three years of toiling in obscurity, it's mere icing that their debut full-length delivers upon what the whispers only hinted at.

Interpol's debut full-length is wrought with emotional disconnection and faded glory, epic sweep and intimate catharsis. Inevitably, the hype exceeds return (that's why it's hype-- and, to be fair, Interpol has largely flown under the radar compared to most other NYC acts), but there's no getting around that Turn On the Bright Lights is an incredibly powerful and affecting album. Loss, regret, and a minor key brilliantly permeate jangling guitars and rhythmic and tonal shifts-- and although it's no Closer or OK Computer, it's not unthinkable that this band might aspire to such heights.

Speaking of Closer, Interpol can't seem to shake being likened to Factory prodigies Joy Division. The cause, however, isn't necessarily evident. Indeed, Daniel Kessler's sublime, angular downstrokes follow the smooth confidence of Carlos Dengler's basslines, and Paul Banks sings with Ian Curtis' downcast delivery and dramatic flair. The difference, however, lies in the music itself: what Joy Division played was sparse and jagged-- punk with a melancholy, but often minimalist bent. Interpol, meanwhile, are punk in ethic alone; their music bears few of that genre's signatures, with the band instead immersing themselves in a grander, more theatrical atmosphere with lush production that counters their frustrated bombast.

"I will surprise you sometimes/ I'll come around/ When you're down," Banks gently affirms over echo-drenched guitar simplicity and rolling bass, as "Untitled" hovers on artificial strings to open Bright Lights. The words are plaintive yet assertive, in agreement with the unsteady warble of the background, and they set the tone for an album that is equally paradoxical-- often bleak, but surprisingly uplifting. Each of the album's eleven tracks evoke raw, unsettling need suffused with delicate serenity. It can be difficult to absorb this much emotional relentlessness, as Banks unflinchingly confronts you with it at all times, but it's precisely this challenge that makes this record so staggering.

The visceral punch of the thematic content is backed at every turn by melody among serrated riffs and amorphous percussion. Discussing the highs and lows of Bright Lights would just be splitting hairs, given its consistency, but a few tracks stand inches above the others. Of the two songs to be carried over from their self-titled EP, "NYC"'s conflicted show of conditional love for the streets of Interpol's hometown is still one of the most brilliant cuts present. And as tight as the EP was, Interpol show how much more they're capable of with "Obstacle 1" and "The New," the range between which is striking. "Obstacle 1" is as close to Joy Division as Interpol gets, coupling harsh, restrained outbursts of aggression with disturbing imagery as Banks clearly gasps, "You'll go stabbing yourself in the neck." The tense lead guitar is a counterpoint, giving these explosive bursts added depth, just as Ian Curtis' emotional collapses were made more poignant by the fragile guitar that cradled them. By the time the album reaches "The New," the anger has dissipated, leaving only the calm sound of sober acceptance.

The tragedy of music press is that when the buzz spirals out of control, people are apt to question a great band's validity, whereas if the band went largely unknown and was 'discovered' independently, so to speak, folks would be less likely to reject the praise out of hand. Whether that will happen with Interpol remains to be seen, but as a member of the press, it's my duty to tell you, from one music fan to another, what I personally think of an album, and in this case, it's that Turn On the Bright Lights has been one of the most strikingly passionate records I've heard this year. That other people I've spoken with have the opportunity to experience it, and that they feel similarly about it, can only be a good thing.

Interpol - The Other Side Of Make-Believe

Interpol's seventh album, The Other Side of Make-Believe (2022), is widely viewed as a "slow-burner" that trades their signature high-energy angst for a more refined, atmospheric, and occasionally optimistic sound. Produced by Flood and Alan Moulder, the record feels intimate and cinematic, a result of the band writing in isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic. Frontman Paul Banks moves away from cynical gloom toward themes of "hard-won experience" and "hope," particularly on tracks like "Toni" and "Go Easy (Palermo)". Some reviewers find the mid-tempo pace makes tracks "blur together" or feel "underwhelming" compared to their classic output. 

Reviewed By Ian Cohen July 19, 2022

After 25 years of fronting one of rock’s most recognizable brands, Paul Banks is not merely the vocalist for Interpol. He is Paul Banks, the Voice of Interpol, a character he has embodied with increasing panache. Maybe that’s always been the case, but especially since Interpol’s return to Matador cemented their status as an A-list cult band, Banks has slyly played on the reality that every one of their albums will be taken by a locked-in audience as a referendum on Interpol. I have to imagine a lyricist as self-aware and witty as Banks has read the tempered praise that has followed everything the band has done since 2007’s Our Love to Admire, and within the first couplet of The Other Side of Make-Believe, he has flexed mastery of this craft: “Still in shape, my methods refined,” he croons on “Toni,” a lyric that absolutely knows it’s going to included in just about every single review of their seventh album to speak to Interpol’s refreshed outlook and its modest success.

More important is the actual first line of The Other Side of Make-Believe: “Flame down the Pacific Highway.” Though nearly every one of their peers who was likewise deemed a quintessential New York rock artist in the 2000s has made their way to the West Coast, the concept of Interpol doing the same triggered some kind of mental 404 error. If not slumming in pornographic subways with shady butchers and catatonic sex toy love-joy divers, what would Paul Banks really be? “On the streets of Cozumel/Where the faces glow/I would gladly give my life to be there,” he replies on “Gran Hotel.” Granted, Interpol has achieved a godlike status in Mexico, but the change in disposition as well as geography is revolutionary for a band who’d otherwise only been capable of incremental sonic change.

Yet, like a massive cruise ship, only a few minor shifts in coordinates can eventually send them off course. “Toni” is the heretofore-inconceivable “Interpol California song,” swapping ambient synth washes for a plinking piano, slacking the eighth-note grid just the tiniest bit, allowing Banks’ voice to relax into a world-weary but satisfied tone. Even if the optimistic bent of The Other Side of Make-Believe is more implied than literal, “Toni” lets in enough sunshine and seabreeze for “Fables” to follow with what Banks calls Interpol’s first “summer jam.” I doubt they intended “Fables” to do battle for Hot 97 supremacy against Bad Bunny or Doja Cat, or even a pop song playing against type a la “Friday I’m in Love.” Nonetheless, it does tease out some of the influences that had been suppressed within Banks’ main gig: a love of boomin’ system hip-hop and the most memorable melody he’s penned in ages. Ironically, it sounds more in line with the kind of festival-topping indie rock that Dave Fridmann helped steward before he all but tanked the production of 2018’s Marauder.

Within these first two tracks, there’s a germ of something more intriguing than a return to form: a latter-day Interpol record where the spirit and the sound are finally in alignment. Though the fully-formed aura that Interpol projected into the elegiac atmosphere of post-9/11 New York City has been chipped away like a disintegration tape by dubious side projects, inessential studio albums, and a reconsideration of the indie culture that propped them up, they all have raised the opportunity for Interpol to take on a pathos of post-punk agitators easing into wisened, witty elder statesmanship—maybe like Nick Cave or, hell, By the Way-era Red Hot Chili Peppers. Banks does seem up for this task, repeatedly leveraging his reputation to sell lines that would be ridiculous coming from anyone else—rhyming the title of “Big Shot City” with “girl you lookin’ gritty,” “You’re truly erupting too hard/That’s why you’re a sizable god.”

But like so much of Interpol’s work since Our Love to Admire, the spark in The Other Side of Make-Believe is subsumed in a gray expanse of Interpol Music, which has largely remained undisturbed by a revolving cast of bassists, auteur producers, and the passage of 20 years. Alan Moulder and Flood are at least better suited to Interpol’s strengths than previous charges like Rich Costey and Fridmann. The duo’s work with the likes of Depeche Mode, Curve, and Nine Inch Nails are about one degree of separation from the band’s enduring influences. Though drummer Sam Fogarino claims Flood was trusted to “hyperbolize our best qualities,” he does so on an a la carte basis on songs that largely betray their origin written remotely in different parts of the world. Daniel Kessler’s sonic structures remain instantly identifiable and also interchangeable, a batch of “Interpol-type beats.” Though working at nearly the same tempo throughout The Other Side of Make Believe, Fogarino drops some much-needed math into the rhythms of “Greenwich” and “Into the Night,” though neither finds any kind of melodic footing. Too often, the trio sounds like they’re writing over or past each other instead of locking in.

Compared to the “refined methods” Banks describes in “Toni,” far less attention has been given to the meta self-evaluation on the closing “Go Easy (Palermo)”: “I’ll keep pushing forward/All the obstacles in my way have been falling.” Even if Turn on the Bright Lights still overshadows the majority of their work—and with its 20th anniversary months away, it will do so even more now—a band at Interpol’s stature mostly needs to talk a good game, assuring they’re still engaged enough to bring a good narrative and 20 or so minutes of new material to a career-spanning setlist. This is made clear by the most Paul Banks of Paul Banks lines on The Other Side of Make-Believe. “All along I was different/’Cuz my nature made me great,” he sings, leaving just enough time to raise the question of “is this guy for real?” And then, the punchline: “But not that great,” a nod from a wise band that knows its limitations.

Interpol - The Black EP

Interpol's The Black EP (2003) is a collectors'-focused compilation featuring a studio version of "Say Hello to the Angels," a "NYC" demo, and four Radio France live sessions. Highlighted by the rare track "Specialist," the EP offers a raw, organic, and often "darker" take on Turn On the Bright Lights material, generally considered essential for fans but less necessary for casual listeners. The live, intimate, and often quieter, more organic production is a, sometimes preferred, departure from the studio recordings, capturing a different, haunted atmosphere. While sometimes criticized as a redundant or "sober" release compared to the debut album, The Black EP is generally lauded for its intense, live feel and the inclusion of "Specialist".

Reviewed August 17, 2003

Black cover. Grim title. Not a single new song. What we have on our hands is a perfect posthumous release, with the sole disadvantage that Paul Banks & Co. are still walking this Earth. Owing less to inspiration than to a multi-pronged strategy for breaking the band in every possible market, Interpol's Black EP arrives to European stores and Stateside hard drives today loaded with some dubious booty. I've kept my backlash impulse in check all through the band's ascent, but that urge (to horribly paraphrase) is out of the icebox.

Opening the disc is "Say Hello to the Angels", arguably one of the weakest numbers on the band's 2002 debut, Turn on the Bright Lights; it's the only one that sounds something like The Strokes, and thus makes for the record's most predictable single. Since the version included here is the same one found on the LP, it makes little sense to discuss it in the context of this EP, although I can't help but note that it does feature the all-time widest gamut of Banks's lyrical skills: going from the genuinely great line, "This isn't you yet/ What you thought was such a conquest," to the lazy, automatic scripture, "You're hair is so pretty and red/ Baby, baby you're really the best," is one of the most painful juxtapositions in quality in the band's entire catalog (though "Obstacle 1"'s "Her stories are boring and stuff/ She's always calling my bluff" still marks the nadir).

Next comes the demo version of "NYC" already available on the Yes New York compilation. Lacking the album's caviar-rich production and Greg Calbi's always impeccable mastering, the song loses most of its whooshing sweep; in fact, it begins to sound suspiciously like something by Luna circa Penthouse. One could argue that isn't a problem, since Interpol will in all likelihood tone down their insecure, overeager fashion sense and tidily fall into that chic, detached role at some point, but the rest of the EP is pure ballast.

The remaining four cuts are culled from the band's August 27, 2002 appearance on The Black Sessions, a popular in-studio concert broadcast on France's Inter radio, aired during Bernard Lenoir's C'est Lenoir program. By now a widely available bootleg (with several additional tracks not included on this EP), their Maison de la Radio Black Session evidences a frequent complaint leveled against these Royal Tenenbaum goths: the sound of their songs in a live setting varies little from how they appear on record. To boot, this was clearly not the band's most "on" performance: the Turn on the Bright Lights tracks ("PDA", "Leif Erikson" and "Obstacle 1") are sober and flat, and impossibly, "Specialist"-- an excellent track they've strategically made something of a "rarity"-- sounds even more exhausted than its dub-like indie jangle.

It's difficult to imagine a reason a label would issue this disc, other than to pacify completists, but the rabid fans will no doubt already have the entire Black Session on MP3. You can throw a bone in a variety of ways, but Black chooses the most insulting one, bouncing widely traded material off our begging noses. The best EPs out there feel like genuine spasms of generosity, even if they're overt placeholders while a band cautiously probes new turf or clears house before a big departure; Radiohead's Airbag/How Am I Driving?, the ne plus ultra of the latter, packed seven songs, ten pages of artwork and Noam Chomsky's biggest paycheck.

Whether or not Interpol have had much of hand in the decision-making behind Turn on the Bright Lights' satellite releases, it is having an affect on their image. That their debut album was priced under $8 until it began to take off was a windfall in cool and credibility, but as their singles discography continues to grow and the level of substance decreases, fans might not be remiss in wondering if the band had planned all along to recoup by selling the same album twice.

Interpol - Our Love To Admire

The most surprising thing about Our Love To Admire, once you’re over the initial shocks of a) that wilfully non-Interpol-esque cover art and b) Carlos D’s new varmint-chewing facial hair, is the fact that for the first time the band have cracked open the shades long enough to allow a few rays of light to penetrate the ever-gloomy world which they inhabit. Granted, it isn’t quite a complete change of weather – Most of Our Love To Admire is still draped in the same perma-drizzle atmosphere which throttled Turn On… and Antics – but when Paul Banks suddenly sounds borderline excited about “Giving something new a try” on No I In Threesome you do wonder if maybe, just maybe, they’ve started to find some fun in this rock stars lark. Or at the very least, in threesomes. However, for each glimpse of a happier place there’s still a shitload of foreboding waiting to bundle the good vibes up in a carpet and fling them off a bridge; it’s hardly an album collecting glow sticks and boarding the bus bound for party-central. But then again, Interpol without the darkness would be like Editors with an original idea or The Fratellis without a Leo Sayer lookalike upfront: unequivocally wrong.

It starts spectacularly. Pioneer To The Falls is a magnificently ominous thing, all skeletal guitar riffs writhing like landed eels, a rhythm section laying weighty footprints down in the back and Banks’ spectral vocal floating wraith-like across the top. As a raspberry blown at those who speculated on the negative effects the move to major label backing may have produced, it’s loud, long and pretty darn-tootin’ decisive. It’s an archetypal Interpol song, albeit deeper, richer and more detailed than anything they’ve managed before. And that’s a common thread. Something like Pace Is The Trick would have been good on Antics, but here it’s extraordinary. Utterly sure-footed, utterly beguiling and hypnotically meticulous in the manner it slowly unfolds each section.

Lead single The Heinrich Maneuver crackles with the freed energy only known to those who have extracted themselves from a crappy relationship. Mammoth is mean, spiteful and delivered with mocking indifference by Banks. But for both, and indeed elsewhere, it’s the way in which the elements of the track click into place with a Swiss watchmaker’s precision and artistry that really hits home. The tempo drops towards the end. They’ve always had a knack of closing things in suitably downbeat fashion and it’s no different here. While Wrecking Ball swings a sad arc of despair with all the slow-building momentum of its titular entity it’s Lighthouse which really shows how far Interpol have come. Washes of Daniel Kessler’s shimmering guitars lap over solidly grandiose brass surfaces and Banks sings a torch song that peels back the taciturn veneer that normally cloaks his voice in icy detachment. Of course, it’s cool as fuck, but there’s a surprising amount of warmth in it too.

Pah. We leave Interpol alone for five minutes and they pull this trick on us. This isn’t the same band we last saw in 2004. It’s a louder, harder, bigger, bolder, smarter, happier, more confident, more innovative, better band then the one left behind. Screw the major label backing, screw the rumours of inter-band tension, Interpol are operating in another galaxy to the majority of those who claim to be their peers.

Interpol - Antics

With their spectacular 2002 debut, Turn on the Bright Lights, Interpol set an immeasurably high mark to follow, and its popularity has ensured equally high stakes: If the band stumbles on this highly anticipated follow-up, their humiliation will be very public...

By David Moore

It's hard to imagine what spurred the density and gloom of Turn on the Bright Lights, an album that, in retrospect, sounds like a popular band reacting to massive overexposure; its masterful statement of bruised withdrawal begged to divide a large fan base, not create one. There was nothing about Interpol's self-contained, visionary debut that might have suggested their subsequent eyebrow-raising catapult to fame, particularly given their aversion to the traditional single format. Perhaps Paul Banks' lucid expression of discontent and impending dread spoke to an increasingly frustrated audience inundated by a generalized threat. Or maybe Interpol's popularity is simply a case of viscerally powerful music confounding formulas of public taste, breaking through purely on the basis of song writing merit. Either way, Bright Lights set an immeasurably high mark to follow, and its popularity has ensured equally high stakes: If the band stumbles, their humiliation will be very public.
Fortunately, the members of Interpol understand what other bands take for granted: Careers aren't necessarily made or broken by second albums alone, and an ideal follow-up needn't engage the perceived potential of a defining debut or consciously redefine a pre-established sound in order to be effective. Redefinition, in particular, is a non-issue for Interpol, because one of the most enduring pleasures of their first album is its timeless singularity. Accordingly, it has been well understood that Antics wasn't going to be, nor could it be, Bright Lights 2. Bootleg versions of new material-- notably the live recordings of "Narc" and "Length of Love" that leaked last summer-- didn't suggest a radically altered aesthetic or faceless repetition, nor does Antics deliver either. Interpol avoid common sophomore pitfalls because they refuse to engage the immense weight that surrounds this release, and their tenuous position between shrewd self-consciousness and diversionary costume changing informs this album's openness and plasticity.
Antics exudes a preceding aura of heaviness-- even the packaging is heavy; the album's cryptic liner notes consist of little more than stark grayscale photos and epigrammatic Morse code spelling out bits of song titles ("Length", "Narc", "Cruise", "Exit", respectively). An image from the band's debut appears on the first single, "Slow Hands", and becomes a representative metaphor for the album as a whole: After reflecting on the aftermath of a soured relationship, Banks takes the "weights" described in Bright Lights' "Obstacle 1" from his "little heart" and projects them onto the woman who presumably put them there to begin with. Musically, however, the song is far removed from the layered density of Interpol's former material, exhibiting pristine, un-muddied production and a chorus ("We spies/ We slow hands/ You put the weights all around yourself") that slithers and stomps with post-punk dance-floor swagger. Similarly, Antics casts off the weight of advance hype, stewing anticipation, and unreasonable expectations, and wisely distinguishes itself as a strong collection of singles rather than as an immaculately cohesive album. And, where Interpol were once synonymous with emotive desolation, they here opt for an atmosphere of poignant resignation.
Opener "Next Exit" is immediately jarring; a tranquilized doo-wop organ progression and spare percussion announce a very different band. It is explicitly clear that Interpol have changed, from the band's more casual tone ("We ain't going to the town/ We're going to the city/ Gonna track this shit around") to new mixing techniques: Carlos D's bass and Daniel Kessler's guitar are relatively hushed in the mix to make room for Banks' underscored vocals, allowing him a range of expression previously unexplored and buoying the band's newfound pop leanings with lyrical eloquence. His vocals on tracks like "Narc" soar where they were once buried in the impermeable fog of their surroundings, and many who found his delivery in the past to be occasionally monotonous (company that includes Banks himself) will find his melodic range here to be a welcome change of pace.
Although most songs evince a clear shift to singles territory, a natural progression of the band's sound is evident. "Evil" employs a Pixies-esque bassline and upbeat rhythm section to counterbalance its ambiguously bleak lyrical themes. The band demonstrates judicious restraint on "Narc", relegating a potentially overbearing blanket of synth strings and organ to a peripheral role while punching up Kessler's crisp guitar lines and Carlos D's almost imperceptibly fluid bass work. The syncopated funk bassline and disco-pop rhythm of "Length of Love" initially seem to be at odds with the song's lush orchestration, but these counter-intuitive touches add a dynamic element to the limited confines of the song's composition. The band hasn't lost its knack for exploration and epic construction, though; "Take You on a Cruise", "Not Even Jail", and "Public Pervert" steep the album's middle section in the kind of dark theatricality that distinguished their debut, while the expansive "A Time to Be So Small", with its deliberate pacing and depiction of "cadaverous mobs," concludes Antics with unsettling macabre.
Though Interpol couldn't be expected to surpass their previous heights, it's difficult to imagine a savvier or more satisfying second step. But the real revelation is that the band has wisely ignored a short-sighted perception of their career which dictates that where Bright Lights was an audacious plunge from a great height, Antics is the crucial landing. Even on those terms the band has succeeded. However, their liberation of form emphasizes the fact that, in the grand scheme of Interpol's career, this is only one in a series of great, if not Great, albums. Antics shows Interpol shedding the weight of their accumulated baggage and staying a while.

Interpol - Turn On The Bright Lights

One might go into a review like this one wondering how many words will pass before Joy Division is brought up. In this case, the answer is 16. Many are too quick to classify Interpol as mimics and lose out on discovering that little more than an allusion is being made. The music made by both bands explores the vast space between black and white and produces something pained, deftly penetrating, and beautiful. Save for a couple vocal tics, that is where the obvious parallels end. The other fleeting comparisons one can one whip up when talking about Interpol are several -- roughly the same amount that can be conjured when talking about any other guitar/drums/vocals band formed since the '90s. So, sure enough, one could play the similarity game with this record all day and bring up a pile of bands. It could be a detrimental thing to do, especially when this record is so spellbinding and doesn't deserve to be mottled with such bilge. However, this record is a special case; slaying the albatross this band has been unfairly strangled by is urgent and key. Let's: there's another Manchester band at the heart of "Say Hello to the Angels," but that heart is bookended by a beginning and end that approaches the agitated squall of Fugazi; the torchy, elegiac "Leif Erikson" plays out like a missing scene from the Afghan Whigs' Gentlemen; the upper-register refrain near the close of "Obstacle 1" channels Shudder to Think. This record is no fun at all, the tension is rarely resolved, and (oh no!) it isn't exactly revolutionary, though some new shades of grey have been discovered. But you shouldn't allow your perception to be fogged by such considerations when someone has just done it for you and, most importantly, when all this brilliance is waiting to overwhelm you.