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Room On Fire |  | Artist: The Strokes
Label: Rough Trade
Category: Music
List Price: £14.99
Buy Used: £1.29
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Seller: zoverstocks
Rating:  90 reviews
Sales Rank: 1828
Media: Audio CD
Discs: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 5.6 x 5 x 0.5
EAN: 5050159813025
ASIN: B0000C8Y0M
Release Date: October 20, 2003
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
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| Tracks:
| • | What Ever Happened? | | • | Reptilia | | • | Automatic Stop | | • | 12:51 | | • | You Talk Way Too Much | | • | Between Love Hate | | • | Meet Me in the Bathroom | | • | Under Control | | • | The End Has No End | | • | The Way it is | | • | I Can't Win |
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| Editorial Reviews:
Amazon.co.uk Review
Rarely has the burden of expectation weighed so heavily as it does on the Strokes' second album. IRoom on Fire/I is an overwhelmingly anxious record, where the band's dilemmas are there for everyone to hear: should they make another record as concise as IIs This It/I? Will they be able to capitalise on their wiry winning formula but avoid exhausting it? And can Julian Casablancas be convincingly offhand when we now know how much effort he makes to sound so disinterested? As a result, IRoom on Fire/I isn't an entirely successful album, but it's certainly a compelling one--the testament of five handsomely talented men struggling to work out what should happen next. At worst, songs like "You Talk Way Too Much" are paranoid retreads where the Strokes, having minted such a precise and appealing sound, seem doomed to repeat it in progressively more joyless ways. p But there are moments when Casablancas nudges his band into new, promising directions. "12:51" seems malnourished on first listen, but its sulky, understated twists soon turn out to be memorable. "Reptilia", meanwhile, showcases the fabulous--and teasingly underexploited--guitar playing of Albert Hammond and Nick Valensi, being a collection of chiming riffs and tumbling solos that suggest the Strokes should allow themselves the freedom to rock more often. Oh, and "Under Control" is a dream--specifically, one where the Smiths are playing "Tracks of My Tears". Best think of IRoom on Fire/I, then, as an album where the Strokes plot their escape from the predictable, but are a little too cautious to make a proper getaway. Courage, gentlemen. I--John Mulvey/I
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| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 90
 grandkids, they will understand December 7, 2003
D. Shaw (London)
6 out of 6 found this review helpful
A lot of people have said that this album is too similar to the first. To repeat the standard of the debut would be one hell of an achievement. But there are significant changes to their sound on the new album anyway. Valensi's guitaring has reached new heights of excellence. Some riffs (tracks 3 or 10 say) achieve a sort of'fairground', 'circus' sound (also reminiscent of 1980s computer game music)- which gives the music a new, weird edge. And once more the riffs never work against the vocals. Like all great albums, it is lean, no musical fat. You couldn't take one bar off without a detrimental effect. Something else I notice: if you listen to the lyrics, most of them seem to be about shaking off groupies. Is this Casablancas' pillow talk? ("I never needed anybody,it won't change", "you talk way too much", "meet me in the bathroom", "You are young darling but not for long".)Golden rule: write about what you know.
pretty damn good guitars November 25, 2003
8 out of 9 found this review helpful
This album is, on first listen pretty rocking. Unlike Is This It (and hey i may as well draw comparisons here, everyone else has), the sound is slightly less like gritty concrete, the most notable instance of this being the superb 'The End has No End'. Track 9 (cant remember the name right now) is one that you will want to stick on repeat until you remember just how good the rest of the album is, and have to play right through again. Other highlights include 'Reptillia'(initial favorite track), 'Automatic Stop', 'The way it is' and 'I can't Win'. The guitars throughout are utterly fantastic, the lyrics are understated, the sound is pure cool.
brilliant album July 28, 2004
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
I discovered The Strokes a bit later than most people but I am now a huge fan. I loved 10 out of 11 tracks on the first album (how often does that happen?) and I think 'Room on Fire' is as good. To me it would be worth buying for either 'Reptilia' or 'Under Control' alone. I think most of their tracks sound deceptively simple at first but get better and better the more you listen to them. '12.51' initially seemed a bit dull but now I completely love it. I have been around long enough to have been into loads of different rock bands, but have found few in recent years that put across the same compelling combination of youthful energy and brilliance - the sort of feeling created by Free or The Who in the 70s - but The Strokes have more great songs. I think anyone who like the first album and slates this just hasn't listened to it enough.
Can't we agree on something now? November 13, 2003
Johnny P. (NW England)
6 out of 7 found this review helpful
Ah, life. Life is full on contradictions, as you may well have noticed. The life of The Strokes' second LP has been particularly full of 'em, or at least its reviews have. Some insist that it sounds EXACTLY like Is This It, while others reckon it's better, and still others are convinced it's much, much worse. Some think Julian shouts too much, some that he's wisely cut down on the shouting since their debut. Even the people who love the album don't seem too agree about which tracks are the best. You get the idea... Now when did you ever see such a mixed bag of reviews?pYou see, we've all let our hopes, expectations and predjudices get on top of us, and we've all taken it out on a bunch of scruffy NYC kids who only ever wanted to rock'n'roll. And NME, of all parties, are the only ones to point out that if anyone has changed, it is us. The Strokes Sound no longer seems as thrillingly new and different to us as it did two years. We know all about them now, their rich backgrounds exposed, their appearance and music copied time and again. We've all gone out and bought Velvet Underground and Television records so that we can pretend we've known about them all along, and those Strokes? Bah, they were just copying.pBut this is a review, right? And since I've just said that all our opinions on ROF are clouded etc, you'll just have to take my opinion into account rather than as fact.pIt's very good. There. pIt's very similar to Is This It, but there's some development here and there. Besides, The Fab Five were a whisker away from recording with Radiohead producer Nigel Goldrich, so it looks like we're in for something different on Strokes III. Maybe it's a good job they didn't go ahead with it, but as Pitchforkmedia put it, "perhaps if they traded Goldrich's number for the DFA's"... Room On Fire is an interesting chapter in the Strokes story, let's hope it's not the last.
Just superb from the New Yorkers! December 29, 2003
Mr. Gideon D. Brody (Manchester, UK)
12 out of 15 found this review helpful
"Reptilia" has to be one of the finest songs ever. Right, now I've got that off my chest I can continue with the review. 'Room on Fire' is one of those albums that, unlike 'Is This It', takes time. Almost guaranteed on your first listen you will comment on the similar idiosyncratic nods it has to The Strokes fine debut. You've got the catchy riffage, the lovesick lyrics, the lo-fi production and the same mic effect on every song, and then you'll probably say something like, "hmmmm, but it isn't as good!"pWell you'd be wrong. With 'Room On Fire' the New Yorkers, who look like one half of the cast of West Side Story, have delivered a fantastically rich and mature collection of songs that, if not wholly indicative of the band's future longevity just yet, does convince you that they are growing and advancing. They certainly do have the potential to become a classic rock band capable of evolving and moving away from the sugar coated simplicity of "Last Night" and "Soma".p"12:51", in itself a clever first single release, as it is the closest this album offers to 'Is This It' but the rest is a wholly more annoyed exercise. Casablancas delivers his sardonic tales of break-up and frustration with typical cockiness yet the emotion in his voice is clearer and certainly less palatable than the last album aside from the wonderful and overlooked "Trying Your Luck".p'Room On Fire' has more surprises musically as well as lyrically. The usual, 'made up in two minutes riffs', are ever present but there are more elements to catch you out on this occasion and sharp changes in tone lie around every bend. p"Automatic Stop" is a tortured tale of denial that you expect to cheer up but doesn't. "Between Love Hate" is more of the same and exposes a rather uncomfortable side to Casablancas and his abject loneliness. pThis album will take time to sink in. So adjust yourself to a new challenging Strokes. Still fresh, still cool, but gratifyingly different.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 90
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