Original subtitles

Day upon day,

and year upon year, O city,

walking your streets.

Give me faces and streets!

Give me comrades and lovers by the thousands!

Let me see new ones every day!

Let me hold new ones by the hand every day!

Give me such shows!

Give me the streets of Manhattan!

People, endless, streaming, with strong voices,

passions, pageants.

Manhattan streets, with their powerful throbs,

with the beating drums, as now,

the endless and noisy chorus.

Manhattan crowds with their turbulent musical chorus.

Manhattan faces and eyes forever for me.

Welcome to New York City.

Sleeping in a van Between A and B

Sucking dick for ecstasy

Paid a 70 year old hooker To make out with me

Now the get-high shack is just a memory

Downloading porn with Davo

Downloading porn with Davo

Put a latch on the door So Mama don't know

That I'm downloading porn With Davo

- Perfect! - Perfect!

You guys wanna be in a documentary?

We're making a documentary.

- Documentary that's... All right. - Cool.

It's a documentary of the hallway.

- Yeah. - Great.

How you doing?

Hello. I'm your new neighbor.

- You guys be our audience. - We're singing songs.

All right. Cool.

- We're singing songs. - Cool guys!

- Who left you people alone tonight? - That's what I wanna know.

My parents thought of us as a delusional experiment

where we didn't know how to play our instruments.

We came to New York to try to prove

we were a real band,

The Moldy Peaches.

Tonight, we're going to a birthday party

for the Queen of fucking France.

We just wanted to find a place to play music.

Hi!

Hi.

- Hi. Hi. - Hi.

The Lower East side was more or less barren,

delis and boarded up places.

Most places we found were sort of

a more bougie club scene.

We'd walk into these rooms and be like, "Oh, oops."

It felt like all of that wild,

weird eclecticness had drained out of the city.

I remember thinking maybe New York isn't the kind

of city anymore

that produces iconic bands.

Even MTV was filled with super dry pop-rock.

And the winner for best rock is

The Offspring!

Blink 182.-

Limp Bizkit, Rollin.

Friday, 2:12 p.m.

- Hey, Adam, what's up? - It's...

Somebody told me, "You should check out"

the open mic at Sidewalk Cafe,

and that's where we found the anti-folk scene.

Yeah.

This community of musicians

that didn't have a place to play.

Oh, yeah.

There's a car traveling down a lone Texas highway

Rams into a giant back

Spirit of the bat fills your fragile eggshell mind

Yeah

Maybe we could fit in here.

When the worlds got you down

Rainy Sundays, sunny town

Tropicana, canned foods

Botulism, damaged goods

See the hipsters in the park

Hair so styled, clothes so dark

Prefab molded hamburgers

I don't want a bite of yours

These burgers are crazy

These burgers are crazy

Let's hear it for The Moldy Peaches!

We were immediately embraced.

Send the tip jar around.

It became our home.

This shy girl called Karen

lived across the street from the Sidewalk Cafe.

She'd come down to play these quiet

acoustic guitar songs.

I was grateful playing at any venue

in New York City,

but it just wasn't exciting me.

I was skulking around the music scene

trying to sniff out some blood.

The last big wave of New York bands

was a long time passed.

I wanted something explosive to happen

without understanding what that was.

One day, me and Kimya were

at our friend's party.

This drunk guy called Julian comes over...

and he's in the bathroom doing drugs with this young lady,

he breaks the shower.

Somebody said he was a singer in a band

called The Strokes.

- This guy's crazy. - I've gotta see this band.

We're sitting here with The Strokes live

in WF Music Studios.

You guys were hot last night.

Scorching!-

Yeah.

Hey, Jules, when did you guys start up?

We started playing New York a year ago.

The last few months we've been tearing stuff up.

You're looking pretty serious.

I am serious, man, I'm always serious.

- Am I ever not serious? - You're more serious...

I don't know what's fuck...

That felt good.

Now it's my turn to break the camera.

The way I met this band,

too many things happened exactly right,

that it seems so hard for it to be just luck.

Four, three, two! Oh, shit.

- Hey, Julian. - Oh, man.

I ran into Julian on the street

seven years after I'd met him

in boarding school.

Then I met everyone.

I just felt it.

The closeness.

We were like brothers.

They were so tight and together,

and are such good friends.

It just feels like the five of them

make up one person.

Just one solid person on stage.

By now, most people have heard of Y2K,

the anagram shorthand for the year 2000

computer problem.

Americans have proven they can handle

even the most devastating natural disaster.

But can we survive a man-made technological meltdown?

It's now time to begin stockpiling

essential survival items.

Military meals, gas masks to knives.

When your kids are standing there cold and hungry,

and they come up

to you and say,"Mommy, Daddy, why didn't you get ready?

"What are you gonna tell them?"

With every tick of the clock toward midnight

in Times Square, emergency officials are

watching for Y2K problems.

The dawning of a new millennium now just minutes away.

We celebrate the future.

What will the story of the 21st century be?

Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five,

four, three, two, one...

From the City Command Center at the World Trade Center,

the Deputy Mayor Joseph Lhota said computer systems

have been checked.

The city is functioning normally.

A friend of mine had a big crush

on this guy Nick.

She dragged me to the Mars Bar

where he hung out.

I felt this very visceral reaction towards him.

I needed to be connected to this person.

She talked like a valley girl

but said that she was from Jersey.

Every other word was "dude".

I'd never met anybody like that.

When you're young and in New York

and you find like-minded people,

you just end up doing things together every night.

Karen played me songs that she had written.

I was just completely blown away.

I may be dead, honey

But I was left with my eyes

And underneath, sugar

Well, I've been sunk by your lies...

One night, Karen said,

- "- Trust me. - We should start a rock band."

We're the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, and, um...

we're from New York City, Brooklyn, and, um...

We, uh...

We've, um...

Do you wanna continue?-

In one night, we wrote six songs.

We were bragging about how amazing we were

to our friend

who was The White Stripes booking agent.

He called our bluff and offered us the opening slot

for The White Stripes show in the Mercury Lounge.

Karen was really insistent

that we get her friend Brian to play drums.

I was really nervous,

and I had four margaritas lined up.

Knocking one back after the other.

Something was completely unleashed,

I was shocked.

I grew up in New Jersey, very shy,

half Korean, half white.

And when you're a halfie, you don't feel like the whites,

you don't fit in with the Koreans.

I was just used to being on the outside.

But on stage, I was free of that feeling.

Once I'd had tasted that, I just wanted

to lose myself in that.

- You guys should get a manager, you know. - Do you guys have a manager?

He's over there, you should point the camera...

It's Ryan Gentles.

That's not a manager, that's, like, a cute little kid.

The first time I saw The Strokes,

I was watching a band that just was born a band.

I was the booker at the Mercury Lounge,

the best club for local bands in New York City.

I booked them immediately.

We're live here with The Strokes.

I know you guys are really hot.

They've been playing every Wednesday night

in December at the Mercury Lounge.

Hello, yeah, we're The Strokes

and we're from New York City.

You just felt it.

The audience was excited that we existed.

Me and Kimya opened for The Strokes.

The first week, we also played with

the Yeah Yeah Yeahs.

So, it was The Moldy Peaches, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs

and The Strokes.

More people crammed in each week.

There was a hysteria in the audience.

These guys were like sex gods.

Suddenly, there were bands everywhere in New York.-

The Strokes launched a fireball.

New York City is like a graveyard

It all happened so fast.

All the corpses like the way I play my guitar

Totally DIY.

You gotta be cute if you wanna get far...

Zero interest from record labels

or magazines.

New York City is like a graveyard

All the tombstones sky scrapin'

All the rock stars double dating

We got it

Blue eyes last forever

Real light it never fades

Real life is a gamble

Pardon me?

So don't give your ace

I desperately wanted to participate

in the scene...

But I'm working at Yeshiva University

in the admissions office stuffing envelopes...

Knowing there's five dudes out there

that are cool as fuck,

writing insanely awesome music

and they are cooler and better than you are.

I was also the singer in a band called Interpol.

We sent our demos to every single record label

I could think of.

No record label showed any interest at all.

It was like all of those guidance counselor meetings

where they're, like, "What do you wanna do?"

And I said, "I wanna be a rock star,"

and they said, "Don't be a jackass."

I was experiencing very deep depression.

I felt like I was slipping

out of existence.

Surprise sometime

Will come around

I will surprise you sometime

I'll come around

I will surprise you sometime

I'll come around

When you're down

Get in the fucking van!

Hello, The Strokes!

I sent The Strokes' demo

to everyone I could think of in the industry saying,

"This is the best unsigned band

in New York City."

Geoff Travis at Rough Trade called the day he received it.

He said, "I wanna sign this and fly the band to England

for a tour."

It was insane!

- It seems so weird. - We're going to England to play music.

Let's go to England!

Oh...

You don't wanna get too carried away.

I'm, like, I'm trying to like just hang with it.

Pretty exciting.

American tourist in England.

Fuck.

Me and Kimya went on tour opening for The Strokes.

We would always joke around and be like,

"We're The Strokes fluffers."

Take your passion

And make it happen

You can come alive you can dance right through...

I was quite a bit older and sober.

I would say to those guys, "Are you sure"

you wanna get wasted?

"You don't wanna remember how cool this is?"

- We're ready, right team? - Go team.

- Go team. All right. - Yay.

Strokes, hello.

- Hello. - Hi.

- Hello. - - I think, first off,

because you're unknown in the U.K.,

just introduce yourselves.

Julian.-

Julian was dealing with a lot of nervousness.

- I was, like, "How is he scared? - He's so good."

But he wrote all of the songs.

His nervousness came out of that perfectionism.

Last night she said Oh, baby, don't feel so down

Oh, it turns me off when I feel left out

So I

I turn around

Oh, baby gonna be all right

It was a great big lie

'Cause I left that night, yeah

Oh, people They don't understand

No, girlfriends They don't understand

Not before coming here. No.

Oh, it's just so weird.

I don't even know what's going on right now, man.

I'm just, you know, it's all...

It's all crazy and cool and bizarre and... you know.

- What's going on? - - You gotta get off here, please.

Keep going. Keep going.

Holy shit.

Holy shit.

Please, please.

Holy shit!

- Get up! Get up! - Get up! Get up! Get up!

- Oh, my God! Oh, my God! - What?

Mayor Giuliani, I wonder if you could give us an update?

Well, the first thing I'd like to do

is take this opportunity to tell everyone

to evacuate Lower Manhattan.

Mayor Giuliani, do you have any sense

of the order of magnitude of injuries and deaths?

I do not, except to say that it's horrendous.

When the buildings fell,

my impression was clearly there won't have been

people in that building.

We walked in the ashy streets picking up papers.

Once they said on the radio, "You should go to the hospitals

"and try and give blood," it started to dawn on me.

Thousands have lost their life.

It's 1-800-GIVE-LIFE.

For blood.

You can call up to give...

I remember feeling how fragile life actually is.

There's anthrax in the envelope

I opened in my dream

Dream the sky is red

And little kids are running screaming in the street

I try to run and save them

But I have molasses feet

I keep having nightmares and I'm scared to go to sleep

In Montreal I got so mad

Someone broke into the van

Stole my guitar and Aaron's bag

Then we turned on CNN watched the towers fall again

Realized that our lives aren't so bad

The air is filled with computers and carpets

Skin and bones and telephones and file cabinets

Coke machines, firemen Landing here and cement

They say that it's okay but I say don't breathe in

I was grieving for my city.

I felt deep trauma.

But when I perform, I could be somewhere else.

Almost, you know, like a split personality.

You're pretty You're pretty

You make we wanna ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh

You make we wanna ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh

You make we wanna ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh

You make we wanna ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh

Hey, hey

Fear and anxiety have become a very real

part of American life.

This, of course is Halloween, a day when fright

is manufactured for fun.

You make we wanna ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh

You make we wanna ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh

You look like shit

You take your time You take your time

You take it

T-T-T-Time

You take your time You take your time

You take it

At Fort Campbell, Kentucky, today,

President Bush rallied the army's 101st Airborne

heading off to support the war

in Afghanistan,

and carved up a turkey, right along with Osama Bin Laden

and his Al-Qaeda forces.

We will never tire, and we will hunt them down!

A grim task of trying to find remains of those killed.

Anxiety and fear...

Terrorist training camp...

Cruise missiles...

- Holy war... - Mass murder...

Casualties- MALE REPORTER 5: Taliban-

- Airstrike... - Terrorists...

Destroyed.

New York felt really claustrophobic.

So much paranoia.

Everyone's confused and scared.

The artists and musicians moved in droves

out of Manhattan across to Williamsburg.

A lot of people quit their jobs,

and just were like, "Fuck it, I'm gonna

play music full-time."

The rent was so cheap that you could afford

to take risks.

You could fail and it didn't matter.

There is a big difference between

Brooklyn and Manhattan.

Brooklyn was about potential and freedom.

Abandoned buildings and warehouses

became practice spaces.

Outside of public attention and expectation.

That's what nurtured us.

We could all be weirdos in the best way possible.

The main bands were the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Onida,

and Sightings, Liars, and TV On The Radio.

This is an excuse for us to hang out with our friends

and...

- Blah, blah, blah, blah. - Blah, blah, blah, blah.

Yeah, this guy.

Come and bust our balls during an interview, man.

He said, "Can you play drums?" "Yeah, maybe."

Whatever drummer...

Whatever, drummer.

What brought TV On The Radio together

is the fact that we're all nerds.

I'm not a very social person, I don't go out.

When I became friends with Tunde,

he was like,

"You have no clothes and no furniture,"

"but you have pain and drum machines."

I was, like, "Yeah, that's kind of the vibe."

I always wanted to make music.

When you're the offspring of immigrants, and you say,

"I wanna be an artist," you might as well say,

"Thanks for all of this but I'm gonna put on

a pair of clown shoes."

But I've gotta get whatever energy that's in me out.

Writing music felt like a prayer.

Your ooh

Slim frame

Your eager eyes

Your wild mane

So they keep me

Where I belong

I'm strung out in song

Oh, I will be your accident

If you will be my ambulance

So I will be your screech and crash

If you will be my crutch and cast

And I will be your one more time

If you will be my one last chance

Oh, sweet tree fall for me

Julian of The Strokes,

there is an element of make believe,

isn't there, in the band...

There's an element of make believe, isn't there?

Swiss schools, elite modeling agency?

- Yes. - Lee? What...

There's an element of make believe in the band.

That's pretty cool.

Meeting at Swiss schools, that's cool.

That's like realistic, it's not make believe,

it's not pretend, it's not fiction.

It's true to life.

I think that's really cool though, like Swiss.

I've never been to a place they call Swiss,

but you guys have, and you met there,

and your dad is, like, John Casablancas.

That's pretty cool and I think he's in some

hot water now, eh?

I don't know. I think...

I don't know, it's weird.

I live with my mom, you know, they divorced

when I was young, so.

I think just... I think life felt a little more normal.

- That was the weirdest part. - That was the weirdest stage of my life.

And it's my great pleasure to introduce to you

the President of the Elite Modeling Agency,

Mr. John Casablancas.-

Julian wasn't really comfortable with fame.

He was always talking about how he wanted

to make underground music.

But he also wanted the music to be popular.

He had this tension inside of him.

So, we're in the U.K.

I have to say...

It's a party in the U.K., I have to say.

You rock.

What's more important, Dave, a good sound or a good time?

- A good time. - Yeah, I agree, do you agree?

Sounding good having a good time.

Every woman fronting a band

in, like, the 30 years before me were pioneers

and I felt like a pioneer.

For men in rock, there's a fucking code,

there's a way you do things.

I just realized for me, there's no code.

I could do whatever I wanted to do up there.

I didn't give a fuck.

Oh, I'm rich

Like a hot noise

Rich, rich, rich

I'll take you out, boy

So stuck up

I wish you'd stick it to me

Flesh ripped off

Ha

Ah

Turn it beating no beat

The walls are always speaking

No want, no want No want no speaking at all

On the very first night in the U.K...

it was pandemonium.

Every club that we would play

would be sold out.

People knew our songs word-for-word.

It was super crazy.

- $5... - - Which shirt do you want?

- This one is the last one. - Let me, uh, sign it for you.

- Hope you had a good time tonight? - - It was fandabidozi.

All the magazines are saying you

are the best band ever.

Right. You are fantastic.

Those are, uh, those are big words.

They're fucking right though.

It was extremely exciting,

and we were all so drunk on that ravenous fanaticism.

- Funny. - What's that?

- Where's Brian? We need Brian to sign it.

Oh, oh, oh.

- Brian, you wanna sign this? - Is Brian back there?

- Write an essay on my shirt. - I am girl.

I know this band's the future.

My name's Carlos, uh, Carlos D. Uh...

I play bass in Interpol.

So, we pooled all of our money together and forced this tour of the U.

K.

I'd never been to England.

This is where The Smiths are from.

This is where New Order is from.

I was on fire.

Somehow, we got booked to play this,

like, little festival called Crucifest.

Next, we're booked in Manchester

on fucking Easter.

You don't play at Uni town on a holiday.

There was, like, five people there.

Oh, you know what, it's not on.

Every person that we met said,

"Do you know The Strokes?"

"Are you friends with The Strokes?"

She says it helps with the lights out

Her rabid glow is like braille to the night

She swears I'm a slave to the details

But if your life is such a big fuckin' joke

Why should I care?

- No one knew who we were. - We shouldn't have been there.

Where do we go from here?

The year after 9/11,

the Parking Lot Show was a manifestation

of appreciation

and love for the Brooklyn Community.

A real assembly of the best

of the Brooklyn bands.

Liars played just before us.

That child...

Oh

That child...

That child throws...

Just throw it out Just throw it out

Just throw it out

There he is!

There he is!

And next!-

There have been times in my life

where I really wanted to fit in and I just didn't.

But you could feel the love from the community.

It was just like a current flowing through me.

It's our time Our time, our time

It's our time Our time, it's our time

To be hated, all right

Well, it's the year to be hated, all right

You know it's the year to be hated, all right

It's the year to be hated, all right

It's the year to be hated

All the stuff we were hearing about

what was going on in Brooklyn

and we were in Manhattan.

I was never really part of any scene.

I'd been recording bands for years.

I had engineered some perfectly engineered records,

but people didn't really hire me.

Loads of crap.

Suddenly this big named Irish techno DJ

- shows up in New York to make a record. - And that's David Holmes.

When I was DJ, I was Iggy Pop.

Just living it.

David didn't seem to know how to play

any musical instruments.

James didn't understand dance music.

And I'm super uptight about this.

Oh, yo, yo...

James had been in a few second-tier Indie Rock bands.

He lived in the office.

He had a small stereo system and an inflatable mattress.

That decade had defeated him.

The first thing I wanted to do

was make a record that sounded like Can.

Wait a second.

Can were people that worked at the Mozartian.

The most prestigious classical music school.

Herman Smidt won the young conductors award,

traveled to New York, seized The Velvet Underground,

blew his mind,

went back and formed a band with the best free jazz drummer

in Europe.

They live in a weird old castle.

They played together eight hours a day.

You're gonna sit there and sample your way into Can?

At this point, I'm going insane.

But the truth is, without David Holmes

DFA, LCD, none of that happens, none of it.

None of it.

New York, how's the scene happening.

Are you conscious of being a part of something right now?

Well, everyone says that there's the scenes,

so that's kind of cool,

you know, and I feel very proud to be put into

the same sentence or whatever with those bands.

Out of the blue, we got given a record deal.

I just couldn't believe it.

This was actually happening.

Finally making a record.

The only studio we could afford

was in the attic

of someone's house in Connecticut.

It really was great to get out of the city

and get away from distractions.

Be it alcohol or cocaine or girls, or whatever

and just focus on the music.

But social life was very important to Carlos.

He didn't wanna miss out.

Which is why I'm very, very obsessed

with the movie Leaving Las Vegas.

Because to me, Nicholas Cage in that movie

almost embodies me.

I wanted to be in New York City

where, like, everything was happening.

Everybody's name is on it?

Don't you have...

There was a lot of tension in the studio.

We couldn't have a conversation

for more than 10 minutes

without telling each other to fuck off.

The fact that this was a collaboration,

I really didn't care.

The most important thing was the song writing dynamic

between me and Daniel.

The best moment really were when

we just didn't talk.

And when Carlos played, it just negated anything else.

I remember being in the studio the last morning

listening to what we had done.

Wow.

I just couldn't believe how good it was.

Driving home from Connecticut to Manhattan,

everything felt totally different.

When I was 17

It was a very good year

It was a very good year

For small town girls

And soft summer nights

We'd hide from the lights

On the village green

When I was 17

New York is bracing itself tonight

for one massive blizzard.

When I was 21

It was a very good year...

It was a very good year for city girls

Who lived up the stair

With all that perfumed hair

And it came undone

When I was 21

- Whoo! - Yeah!

- Hallelujah! - All right!

Halle-fucking-lujah, man!

The way we've been portrayed.

New York City good looking dude.

- A bunch of rich kids... - - Who think they're really cool.

If I heard of a band like that, I'd think they were assholes.

Excuse me. Excuse me.

In New York, I was like a wild animal

out of its cage.

My gang was just getting up to no good five nights a week.

I don't dance, I barely drink.

I don't wanna embarrass myself.

I remember talking him into it.

- "- You gotta try it. - This is gonna change everything."

People were touching me, chanting my name.

I'm experiencing this music in this totally new way.

I really enjoyed dancing.

It is not the drug.

This is actually me...

and my life is forever changed.

- Tim was the producer and programmer. - For David Holmes.

He and I would be the ones stuck in the room

having to sort through the shit after everyone's left.

He taught me how to use the computer to experiment.

Working with him was perfect.

After watching what Holmes could wind up doing,

it just seemed obvious to us.

What if we did something of our own?

Something that makes people

who didn't normally dance, dance?

But if we were going to be a label,

we really needed to find a band.

A band that we believed in.

So, the name of our band

is The Rapture.

The name of our band is The Rapture.

- What's your name? - Matt.

- And your name? - Gabriel.

The band started on the west coast.

We lived in this suburb of San Diego,

where there's nothing going on.

We just decided to pack up the band,

book a tour to get out to New York.

I mean, I was legitimately, like,

19 years old.

Very green.

- We were broke. - We had no money at all.

I came to New York as a complete leap of faith.

New York, it's almost like this white chalk outline,

it's like, "Do whatever you want in here,"

"be as, like, as free and as angry as you want."

I would go on Avenue A to this magazine store

and buy copies of "NME" and I'd be like,

"Dude, like, this is all happening around me"

"and eventually they're gonna find me."

One, two, three, four

Five, six, seven

Come dance with me...

The first time I saw The Rapture,

I was completely smitten.

Luke looked insane and had this amazing,

weird voice.

He was super charismatic.

James Murphy and Tim were just fuckin' nuts.

And I loved that.

We were a punk band that was trying

to make dance music.

We had similar goals,

just coming at it from different angles.

James and Tim felt like the only other people

on the planet who had the same ideas.

And DFA was like a clubhouse.

Euphoric party nights.

We'd listen to records, wrote songs, drank too much.

We felt like we were gonna take over the world.

MTV wanted The Strokes to play a concert.

A 30-minute live broadcast special.

It was a big deal.

It was exposure.

But a lot of those things come with,

"Well, if you don't do this, you're never gonna get

played on here again."

It's not working.

Just...

I would just remember there will be people

behind you,

so just don't forget to address the back, too.

Ten, nine, eight, seven,

six, five, four, rolling.

Ladies and gentlemen, here they are.

The Strokes.

No choice now It's too late

Lisa said take time for me

Dropping him down to his knees

He knows it's justified to kill to survive

He then in dollars makes more dead than alive

Let's suck more blood

Let's run three hours a day

The world is over but I don't care 'cause

Take two.

Rally forward!

- Guys, take three. - Rally forward.

Rally forward.

- Take five. - Four. Two.

The first time it happened too fast

The second time I thought it would last

We all like it a little different

The first "NME" cover that we did,

the caption was "Cool! Sexy! Drunk!"

Three words that don't just make much

sense together.

And one of the things that started to surface

with the press was a sort of predatory gaze.

Photographers were boys being in the front row

at our shows.

Arm outstretched, weird expression on their face,

trying to get like crotch shots

under my skirt.

I just remember feeling very protective about Karen.

Being a woman fronting a rock band,

I was sensationalized.

But I was also struggling to be taken seriously

as an artist.

That costume that you were wearing,

the yellow, it's almost like

an Elvis jumpsuit.

That was sort of...

Have you ever had the same sex experience...

- Do you have any thoughts on chastity? - - Chastity?

Karen, have you ever experienced Madonna syndrome?

Do you remember your first kiss?

Is it a tough kind of thing to be so cool?

Have you received any death threats?

- What's your favorite meal? - My favorite meal?

So, let me, uh, let me hear all the ladies out there tonight.

All right.

Let me hear all the boys out there tonight.

Okay, let me hear all the men out there tonight.

I'm here to represent for the ladies.

It's all or nothing.

I wanna date with the night

When we made House Of Jealous Lovers

it wasn't necessarily like fun in the studio.

House of jealous lovers

First, we recorded everything live.

And then Tim and I started ripping it apart.

I can get really anxious if I feel like

I'm compromising my music.

I feel compulsion to make the music

exactly the way I think it should be.

James was the first person I met

who was more alpha than me.

I had all these ideas in the studio,

he had all these ideas.

I couldn't bulldoze him.

I was never good at friends.

I was so lonely and so self-conscious.

I wanted connection and friends,

but I'd always end up in fights.

There was just something wrong with me

that wasn't wrong with other people.

So, I made music fucking alone.

- He was really pushing me. - I was in a lot of pain.

Get rid of the drum, face the bass...

Get rid of the guitar completely.

Me and Tim just kept telling him

and everyone around him was just like,

"You're domineering, and you need to make

your own fucking record!"

There was a part of James that wanted to be in the band.

Wanted it to be his band.

He didn't have his own outlet.

They really freaked out about the production.

They thought everyone was gonna hate

that it was a house song.

- He was really just like, "No. - It's perfect, we're not fixing it."

House of jealous lovers

House of jealous lovers

People went fucking crazy for it.

People just called us the disco Strokes.

House of jealous lovers shakedown

Goldsworthy and engineer James Murphy

are the production team whose fusion of minimal electronic

and post-punk rock continue to thrill

critics and listeners worldwide.

You know, half the people, you know,

someone told them it was cool.

You know what I mean? "Cause theoretically,"

we're... cool.

Nobody else was playing the records

I was playing.

That was like my thing.

One hand ties the other

House of jealous lovers...

Pure idolism, ridiculous mess.

I had my first E, and lost my virginity

at the same DFA party.

We weren't downtown New York cool kids,

and we weren't Brooklyn Art School kids either,

but somehow, we had a scene.

How do you guy sit down and write a song?

Because I know you write the lyrics, but do you-

No, Julian does the lyrics.

- Yeah. - He writes the song.

- Oh, and the songs? - Oh, yeah.

- Okay... - And the guitar solos,

everything, dude.

- Really? - Sure. Yeah.

That's... Yeah.

I always wanted to write songs.

The most frustrated I ever got,

I had a song and thought it could

really work in the band.

I was super-excited about it.

But Julian had a very precise vision.

The only thing I have control on

is having good songs.

Even if everyone loves it, I always go home thinking,

"Is it good enough?"

It's a struggle.

It was a lot of pressure on Julian

to get another album out there as soon as possible.

We had been praised as "Rock's Saviors",

but all we had ever recorded was a half hour record.

Ready?

We got back from touring and spent a month

in our rehearsal space...

and just worked.

Why were we rushing?

What is the ideal place

for somebody to listen to your new record

for the first time?

I hadn't thought of that.

Read their last rights.

No, I don't know.

Nikolai, man, help me out.

I don't know, man, we just finished it today,

you know.

How do you guys feel about it?

- I... - Tense but confident.

You sound incredibly down on yourself.

It's odd to hear you guys feel intimidated.

Feel like you guys aren't gonna end up sizing up and...

think that you guys are ultimately

gonna be forgotten.

I don't wanna let people down.

- Karen rules... - She's very good.

- She's the coolest person on earth-

-And Nick.

- And she's a God. - Nicks amazing.

She just does what she wants,

- and she doesn't care about anyone else. - -Yeah.

She's sexy!

- Her hair, her face, everything. - Her voice.

I'd do her.

I'd do her.

She seems shy, like, offstage, but she puts on this

crazy character.

The Yeah Yeah Yeahs are going on in five minutes.

Can you please return?

I had set myself up as being a pretty

spectacular self-destructive persona.

I was needing to live up to that,

and I was beating myself up out there night after night.

I was seeing the fanaticism around Karen.

The press, freaky fans.

And just seeing how fragile she was off-stage...

I was worried.

Ah, this fuckin' hurts.

Do you know what I'm saying?

It's like fucking shit!

- Who the fuck cares? - Do you know what I'm saying.

Do not fucking tread on me!

I really did want to speak to someone

who could relate to how I was feeling.

But my experience was so different

from the men around me.

It was incredibly lonely.

It's just wearing me down, the lifestyle,

the physical aspect of it, the repetition of it.

The business of it and the bullshit of it

and the press and the attention.

- Can we have sound, speed? - Roll cameras, please.

- Roll joints. - Do speed.

Ready.

We're still waiting for the...

It's a rehearsal so let's just do it, right?

Do you need to play?

- It's just a rehearsal. - Can we just start?

Okay, we are rolling.

Julian had dreams that he just maybe assumed

we'd all just follow.

Room on Fire sold, like, 650,000 records

and everybody wants to write about

what a big failure it was.

By what it was built up to be, it was supposed

to sell millions.

That's when friends, girlfriends,

strangers started coming in.

"Julian's slowing everyone down."

"You should be a bigger band."

I felt that distance between me and Julian.

- Well, its Ryan Adams. Look at you.

-Hey, man.

- The most difficult man in rock and roll. - -Oh, geez.

Ryan Adams was really, really into The Strokes.

Enamored by them.

We're gonna play a song by The Strokes

called Last Night.

Yeah, it's our best song.

He'd always come and like wake me up at two

in the morning to have drugs.

So, I would just kind of, like, do the drugs

and kind of numb out.

I remember Julian threatening to beat him up

if he hung out with me.

I knew I would shoot up drugs from a very young age.

When it came, it wasn't, like, "What am I doing here?

It was kind of like, "I made it."

I was home.

Number one.

The win immunity, we're number one, watch this.

After House Of Jealous Lovers blew up,

we had all this attention.

But we were touring the world on a single.

It was so fun.

The Rapture, me and Tim were a gang.

We felt invincible.

We had just finished Echoes, this album that we really loved.

And then compound that with the music industry

feeding frenzy in New York,

and it was just this perfect timing.

But in the beginning, DFA was more about concept

than an actual functioning label.

DFA spent a year trying to find a distributor

and failed to do so.

The clock was ticking.

I wish we had just put fucking Echoes out.

That was a fucking mistake.

The songs that are on the record,

we've been playing them out for like a year

and a half, like...

So, it's just like...

It's just time for it to come out, like...

I was more scared than I'd ever been

in my entire life.

It's gonna fucking disappear, it's gonna be over.

I know they had to, but when they left,

the crushed me.

I cried.

I just cried.

We were Rapture Records.

That's what DFA was.

But they left.

We didn't want to leave DFA.

Those were, like, our closest friends.

But we needed to get our record out.

We hit 40,000 records sold.

Our record company was, like, "Whoa!"

We had this incredible energy between us,

this kinetic energy.

We nailed the second record

straightaway.

This is the record that we've been waiting for.

Three months before release date,

we were out at some bar.

A complete stranger comes along singing lyrics

from the second record.

What the hell's going on?

The record had leaked.

I couldn't believe that this was actually happening.

I went to this club, Brownies,

which I used to play at all the time.

There was a kid DJ-ing, playing ESG,

and he plays a Liquid Liquid song.

What the fuck?

These records took me years to find,

and now some kid can just download it?

Wait a second.

You didn't write them, you just play them,

you just own them,

you can't be proud of yourself

for owning it.

But I know that kid was at one of my parties.

Even if this person went to one of our parties,

I have no rights here.

It's the fucking closest I've ever been

to cool in my life

and this fucking kid can take it?

I was playing that six months ago.

First of all, it's not your record,

you didn't make it.

What's worse than that guy?

I'm disappointed with myself.

- Its stupid and embarrassing. - - I'm a total hipster

jackass, I have been my entire life.

I'd really wasted 30 years of my life.

And I would lock the studio...

sing a song about losing my edge.

I'm losing my edge...

How humiliating it is to be me.

To the kids From France and from London

I'm losing my edge

It was the first time I made music

where I wasn't trying to be another thing

that I thought I'm supposed to be.

Yeah, I'm losing my edge

I'm losing my edge

To kids

I'm coming up from behind

But I was there

I was there in 1968

I was there at the first Can show in Cologne

But I was there

I was the first guy playing Daft Punk to the rock kids

I played it at CBGB's

Everybody thought it was crazy

We all know

I hear everybody that you know

Is more relevant than everybody that I know

I came upstairs and played it for Tim.

He said, "You don't wanna put"

this out, man.

"You really don't want people to hear this."

But I've lived in fear my whole life...

and I had nothing to lose.

Julian always wanted the whole band together.

I'd show up late in the studio.

And smoke too much crack before coming in

and had to take a bunch of pills

just to calm down.

I wasn't playing that well.

I've tried everything to get fired.

Remember that girl that was downstairs,

that said she didn't care about The Hives and The Strokes,

and she just wanted like a big rock riff?

- I think that ought to do it. - We are, um, we're back.

We had a little nap, and we are really staying up

for 24 hours and...

not many people in this room do drugs.

We're in a corporate environment.

Come here, come here.

Courtney Love was doing a take over

of MTV for 24 hours.

- Show us your. - Come on!

- Yes! - I'll do it if you do it!

She texted me, "Do any of The Strokes

wanna pop up?"

I called Albert.

You're fucked up and the idea's funny.

Oh, yeah, I'll go up there and, like, see Courtney Love.

- Wait, what are we doing? - Why are we?

I was so fucked.

Her and Ryan were just doing their thing

what Ryan always does.

When things go bad, you just want it to get worse.

When the band catch you out of it.

I can be sitting here with my eyes open and just...

gone.

There's so many times where I was just so close to...

to dying.

It could be over.

We could be over, you know.

Out of nowhere I got an offer

from Arthur Baker.

He'd heard our record and he wanted us to come

play a show in London.

There's no way I can do this.

I can't do it.

- I don't have a band. - It's just me and a toy boom box.

I did the only thing I could do,

call the people that I knew.

Tyler, the base player in Out Hud,

Pat, the drummer in Les Savvy Fav,

Phil Mossman, guitar player, who had done

the David Holmes' record,

and Nancy, my drinking buddy,

took piano as a kid.

Deciding to start a band

in your 30's seemed absurd.

We only had 10 days to rehearse.

This was his first time as a front man

singing in front of people.

Nothing terrified me like watching footage of John Lydon.

It made me feel so uncomfortable.

I realized this would be

my problem.

The people that are dancing...

and he just doesn't exude himself.

Oh, my God.

I don't know what to do with myself.

James wanted to set up very, very close

together on stage.

So, he was totally surrounded.

Protected.

Go ahead...

Well, Daft Punk is playing at my house, my house

I'll show you the ropes kid, show you the ropes

I got a bus and a trailer at my house, my house

I'll show you the ropes kid, show you the ropes

'Cause Daft Punk is playing at my house, my house

You've got to set them up, set them up

My house

My house

You've got to set them up, set them up

The song "This is it,"

is that a sarcastic reference

to The Strokes?

No, no, no, no, no!

I've heard that from many people

and it's like,

"Damn, if I were gonna write a song about The Strokes,"

"I would probably go a little further."

That's just the name of the song.

But I can see why people think that.

It goes to show you how influential

The Strokes guys are.

That these guys are just great.

Hello.

I wanted to ask you about this before we left.

I think it's awesome.

- What? - Yes... The holster.

Well, thanks, thanks a lot.

And I don't know if anyone's ever done that before.

Um, to my knowledge, they haven't.

But it wasn't, you know, me trying to be an innovator.

It wasn't me trying to be an innovator to...

to wear the holster.

If I get followers, so be it.

- Yeah, so be it, exactly. - I'm not gonna, like, stop them.

We're Interpol, and you're watching MTV2.

You've had stuff's thrown at you, like,

there's been panties thrown at you, Carlos?

Uh, there was an occasion where panties

were thrown at me, yes.

It seems like you've been touring constantly.

It seems like you've hardly really had a break.

What's fans reactions been to this new album?

Wherever we've gone, it's been just kind of, like,

a similar sort of excitement and enthusiasm.

Before Napster, we would have made

a shit load of money.

But actually...

I didn't really care.

Because people from all around the world

found out about our music.

I remember thinking back to all of those

guidance counselor meetings...

when I said, "I wanna be a rock star."

Yeah, but nobody searches

And nobody cares somehow

When the loving that you've wasted

Comes raining from a hapless cloud

And I might stop and look upon your face

Disappear in the sweet, sweet gaze

See the living that surrounds me

Dissipate in a violet place

Can't you see what you've done

to my heart and soul

This is a wasteland now

We spies, we slow hands

Put the weights around yourself

We spies, oh, yeah We slow hands

We retire like nobody else

We spies intimate slow hands

Killer for hire you know not yourself

After falling from the stage in a show

in Australia last month,

Karen O, the tough front woman of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs

still managed to compose herself enough

to perform Maps.

Pack up

I'm straight

Enough

Oh, say, say, say

Oh, say, say, say

Oh, say, say, say

Oh, say, say, say

Oh, say, say, say

Wait, they don't love you like I love you

Wait, they don't love you like I love you

Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah

Just wait

They don't love you like I love you

Wait, they don't love you like I love you

Wait, they don't love you like I love you

Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah

Just wait

For they don't love you like I love you

Wait, they don't love you like I love you

Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah

Just wait

They don't love you like I love you

- I'm so annoyed with this dude. - - What dude?

So, here it's just things like,

"I'm sad because I had a show booked with LCD."

"The date, like, all U.S. dates got canceled."

There was no fucking U.S. tour.

We never had a U.S. tour.

Are you responding to it?

- Yeah. - What are you gonna say?

I have to say this shit sounds a lot like

a fucking guilt trip.

What are you, my mother?

Eat it.

Fucking baby.

Why are you getting so angry?

I... Just the concept of emailing somebody

is so alien to me.

So, you're tied up?

- Oh, I don't wanna do this. - I hate this so much.

James, I'm serious, lip sync to a different song.

Sing a different song.

- I'm doing that now. - It's called talking.

I can talk all day.

Those years were the big bang of my life.

I finally found my friends.

Can we do claps again?

Yes!

I felt safe.

The Brooklyn Waterfront will likely be getting

a makeover.

Mayor Bloomberg wants to rezone part of the area...

The neighborhood has had a rebirth

and now it's a choice location for commerce and for living.

It is no longer a well-kept secret.

What began with a trickle has turned into

a flood of Manhattanites

crossing the East River into Brooklyn's

Williamsburg neighborhood.

- Many of them drawn... - - Our rent had tripled in three years.

The landlords cleared out whole fucking buildings.

Pushing families out.

I was grieving the dissipation of the scene.

I don't want to stick around and just watch it go away.

I left New York City.

I felt too nostalgic for it when everything happened.

See now, everybody was just playing music,

you know what I'm saying.

- It's nuts, yeah, good music. Everywhere.

- Yeah, yeah.

- Yeah. - Yeah.

It was like a flash.

When we first met, that's what we bonded over,

It was...

the belief that we could accomplish

anything we wanted to.

Everything was so innocent,

and somehow you lose it through time

and then you spend a lot of time

chasing that same innocence,

that feeling of just being young.

Day upon day,

and year upon year, O city,

walking your streets,

Keep your splendid silent sun.

Keep your woods, O Nature,

and your corn-fields and orchards.

Give me faces and streets!

Give me comrades and lovers by the thousand!

Let me see new ones every day!

Let me hold new ones by the hand every day!

- Give me such shows! - Give me the streets of Manhattan!

People, endless, streaming, with strong voices,

passions, pageants.

Manhattan streets, with their powerful throbs,

with the beating drums, as now.

The endless and noisy chorus.

Manhattan crowds with their turbulent musical chorus.

Manhattan faces and the eyes forever for me.

Many years since I was here

On the street I was passing my time away

To the left and to the right

Towers tumble to the sky

It's out of sight

In the dead of night

Here I am again in the city

With a fistful of dollars

And, baby, you better believe I'm back

Back in the New York groove

I'm back

Back in the New York groove

I'm back

Back in the New York groove

I'm back

In the New York groove

In the New York groove

In the back of my Cadillac

A wicked lady sittin' by my side

Sayin', "Where are we?"

Stopped at Third and Forty-three

Exit to the night

It's gonna be ecstasy

This place was meant for me

I feel so good tonight

Who cares about tomorrow

I'm back

Back in the New York groove

I'm back

Back in the New York groove

New York groove

I'm back

Back in the New York groove

New York groove

I'm back

In the New York groove

New York groove

I'm back

Back in the New York groove

New York groove

I'm back

Back in the New York groove

New York groove

I'm back

Back in the New York groove

New York groove

I'm back

New York groove

New York groove

- I'm back - New York groove

New York groove

- I'm back - New York groove

New York groove

- I'm back - New York groove

New York groove

- I'm back - New York groove