The Solo-rific Strokes?!

October 16th, 2008

Although The Strokes have been on hiatus for more than a little while, their ridiculously brilliant discography is still an amazing listen. But it has been a while. Their last album, First Impressions Of Earth came out way back in January 2006 and they stopped touring that fall, but since then the boys have been keeping busy.

Julian Casablancas (vocals): Frontman Julian (who never really played any instruments in The Strokes), picked up a guitar and proved himself multi-talented on the Queens of the Stone Age single Sick Sick Sick in 2007. This year he also recorded a song with the lovely Santogold and N*E*R*D’s Pharrell for Converse called My Drive Thru. Something kinda random but also kinda cool? He partially owns a just opened restaurant in LA with Mark Ronson.

Albert Hammond, Jr. (guitar): Probably the busiest of the bunch. Albert released his debut album Yours To Keep in 2006, toured a heck of a lot (supporting Bloc Party, and also headlining his own tour), released his second album Â¿CÃ³mo Te Llama? spring 2008, toured some more, and just finished touring with Coldplay on their European tour. I’ve seen him live twice and love him to bits.
MySpace

Nick Valensi (guitar): The least busy of the bunch? Nick sang some backup vocals and played some guitar on Devendra Banhart‘s 2007 album Smokey Rolls Down Thunder Canyon. In 2007 he also played guitar on Regina Spektor‘s sweet song Better.

Nikolai Fraiture (bass): Nikolai’s side project Nickel Eye played their first full show October 15, 2008, during which he sand a mini a capella version of Nelly‘s Hot In Herre. Nickel Eye’s debut album will be released January 27 2009 and will feature guests Regina Spektor and Nick Zinner of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Should be interesting!
MySpace

Fabrizio Moretti (drums): Fab’s side project is called Little Joy and their album it set to come out November 4! They just finished touring with Devendra Banhart but are still on the road playing their own headlining shows. MySpace

And that’s all folks. Or is it? Lookie what was written this summer on the good ol’ Strokes website…