The Strokes: New York Rockers' Early Years Revealed In New Photo Book
New York City during the first decade of the 2000s was a wellspring of young bands eager to spit in the faces of music critics who'd been quick to call radio's transition from the largely Seattle-based sounds of grunge and post-punk alternative into the bubblegum pop sounds of the new millennium the dying gasps of guitar-driven rock.
Leading the charge during that period, the Strokes were one of the biggest of the "local" bands playing the club circuit, and also one of the first to really break out onto the global scene and sign a huge deal with a major label. This era of raucous rebellion has been recently documented in Lizzy Goodman's fantastic compilation Meet Me In The Bathroom: Rebirth And Rock And Roll In New York City: 2001-2011, which chronicled the various bands – the Strokes chief among them – who were central to that rising movement.
A new catalogue of moments from that singular time will also arrive this October: music photographer Cody Smyth has compiled his best stories and photos from his years embedded with the Strokes into a forthcoming volume titles The Strokes: The First Ten Years. The book will be the "first authorized visual record" of the band's early years, and is being heralded as, "a peerless window into the group through the lens of a close friend who was there before it even began."
The Strokes: The First Ten Years is due out on Oct. 10.
