Interpol (album)

Interpol is the fourth studio album by the American post-punk revival band Interpol, released on September 7, 2010 on Matador Records. The album was recorded at Electric Lady Studios in Greenwich Village. "Lights" was released as a free download through the band's website, originally in May 2010 with an accompanying video released in June 2010 by Charlie White. Bassist Carlos Dengler left shortly after the album's completion. The lead single "Barricade" was released in August 2010.

Recording

Recording started in early spring of 2009. The band announced that they were writing new songs in March of that year.

Release

Critical reception

Critical reaction to Interpol has been mixed. Aggregating website Metacritic notes that Interpol and Our Love to Admire which preceded it have served to establish a downward trend with regard to critical reception since their second release, Antics, although its rating of 66% based on 33 critic reviews means it is still considered to have released to "generally favorable" reception.^[14] AnyDecentMusic? shows a rating of 6.3 based on 33 reviews.^[15] Victoria Segal of Q awarded the album four out of five stars, stating that "Paul Banks's vocals as attention-grabbing as a hand on the back of the neck while subtle textures rub up against the drama of the guitars" and concluded by saying that "for a band who specialise in the dark, their touch is thankfully light".^[12] Chris Coplan from Consequence of Sound praised the "rich narrative" and "brilliant pacing found throughout the record" and described it as "a story that builds from an emotionally-resilient semi-joyousness in the beginning [...] to creepy, morose, and sinister by the end".^[16] Iann Robinson of CraveOnline described the album as "epic, sad, disastrously emotional music that is written to exploit feelings of melancholy and despair" and noticed that "with so much pop music either dedicated to false sentiments of love or infant bouts of angry tantrums it’s kind of nice to hear a band looking into deeper ideas".^[17] Simon Vozick-Levinson of Entertainment Weekly felt that on Interpol "the riffs [...] are grander, the rhythms more limber, and the melodies more memorably moody than they've been in years" and stated that "lapsed fans may be surprised to find themselves reminded of why they loved this band in the first place".^[4] Rob Sheffield of Rolling Stone called it "a surprisingly solid comeback" and praised Daniel Kessler's guitar as "the essence of arty post-punk romance".^[9] In an early track-by-track review of the album, Paul Stokes of NME wrote that the band is "as atmospheric and dark as they were on their debut, and yet more intricate, and - as the trumpets prove - orchestral".^[18]

Benjamin Boles from NOW gave the album three stars out of five, saying that the band does not sound "exactly eclectic in mood, sound or even tempo" and noticing that "the best moments come when they shy away from their trademark wall-of-reverb blueprint". He concluded by saying that "it’s a better album than their last, and diehard fans should be satisfied, but it’s not going to get the rest [...] very excited".^[19] Josh Modell of Spin found it "more dull than hypnotic". He felt that "it tries to assemble skyscrapers, but ends up muddling around without a strong foundation" and noticed that Interpol sounds "both strangely distant and overly familiar, like a band struggling to remember who they are".^[10] James Reed of The Boston Globe said that most songs have "room to ramble but nothing resembling a core" and called it "heady and disorienting".^[20] Greg Kot of the Chicago Tribune described the album as "bits and pieces of promising music without strong foundations" and stated that although "the band sounds terrific", the album does not offer "more than one or two truly memorable songs".^[21]

Track listing

All songs written by Interpol.

Personnel

• Paul Banks – lead vocals, guitar
• Daniel Kessler – lead guitar, piano
• Carlos Dengler – bass, keyboards
• Sam Fogarino – drums, percussion

Additional personnel

• Alan Moulder – mixer
• Claudius Mittendorfer – engineer
• Greg Calbi – mastering engineer

Charts

To date, the album has sold around 400,000 copies worldwide.

References