Interpol Biography
Interpol is a New York City based indie rock band formed in 1998. Their debut album Turn on the Bright Lights was critically acclaimed, while the follow-up, Antics, has also been a commercial and critical success. The members of the band are Paul Banks on vocals and guitar, Carlos Dengler on bass and keyboards, Sam Fogarino on drums, and Daniel Kessler on guitar and background vocals. The group recently released their third album, Our Love to Admire.
Interpol’s sound is a dark mix of bass throb and choppy, sparse guitar. The band has been somewhat likened to Joy Division and The Chameleons, whose stark, sombre music and sometimes perplexing lyrics it is thought to echo. Where Turn on the Bright Lights had been spare and tentative, Antics used a fuller, more confident sound. Both Antics and Turn on the Bright Lights were recorded by Interpol at Tarquin Studios in Bridgeport, Connecticut.
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The band formed when Daniel Kessler met drummer Greg Drudy, now a member of screamo band Hot Cross, on the New York University campus. Kessler later added Carlos D., an ex-guitarist, on the bass, after meeting him in a history class. Interpol was complete after Kessler remembered an old friend he met while in Paris. Banks and Kessler ran into each other on the street, after losing touch since Paris, and Banks became lead singer. In 2000, Greg left the band, and Daniel recruited Sam, whom the band knew through his job at a local record store.
Origin of the name Interpol
There is confusion about origin of the name Interpol. An article in SPIN magazine said one of Paul Banks’ classmates was fond of teasing him by saying “Paul, Paul, Interpol.â€? Yet guitarist Kessler has said the band “…had played shows with no name, and then I got to the point where I was like, ‘Guys, we’re getting decent crowds, but like… we don’t have a name so no one knows who to go see again.’â€?
The band are said to have considered Las Armas and The French Letters as names before adopting Interpol. They also famously performed a little publicized show at the Luna Lounge in New York under the pseudonym Cuddleworthy.
Demos (1998-2001)
After self-releasing several EPs between 1998 - 2001, in early 2002 the band signed to indie label Matador, an independent label famous for breaking highly respected bands such as Pavement. The first release, a self-titled EP containing rerecorded versions of PDA and NYC — possibly to incorporate Fogarino’s distinctive drumming, as Greg Drudy had left the band shortly after the release of Fukd I.D. #3 — was released on June 4, 2002 to widespread critical acclaim in the indie music scene, which built anticipation for the full-length album.
Turn on the Bright Lights era (2002-2003)
Turn on the Bright Lights was released on August 19, 2002, again on Matador, and is widely considered one of the best albums of that year, making it into many ‘Top 10 of 2002′ lists. Recorded at Tarquin Studios in Bridgeport, Connecticut, the record sold exceptionally for an independent release, and the band toured extensively, receiving a good deal of media coverage, making television appearances on Late Night with David Letterman, Last Call with Carson Daly and featuring on BBC Radio 1 and the NME Awards Tour in the UK. The album title is taken from a lyric in the song NYC: “wake up to me now / turn on the bright lights.”
Antics era (2003-2005)
The band regrouped in late 2003 to begin sessions for the follow-up album, again decamping to Tarquin Studios to record. On September 28, 2004, Antics was released on Matador. The album achieved far greater commercial success than Turn on the Bright Lights, perhaps due to the lighter, more accessible arrangements and bigger hooks featured in songs such as Slow Hands, Evil and C’mere. Although generally considered inferior to Turn on the Bright Lights in musicianship, the record still garnered much critical acclaim and was once more a popular choice on critics’ Top 10 lists for 2004. The record also saw Interpol record their first UK Top 40 hits with Slow Hands, Evil, and C’Mere all charting, at 36, 18 and 19 respectively. The albums title comes from an unused lyric Banks wrote during the recording process.
Interpol toured once again after the release of the album, playing more dates than ever before and at bigger venues. The Antics tour stretched on for almost 18 months, including a number of shows playing as undercards for U2 and The Cure, and the band reported feelings of exhaustion to Radio 1 DJ Zane Lowe at a concert in Sunderland. Perhaps due to this, the band took a year off after touring finished. Whilst on the road, the band had also released the one-off track Direction, written for the official soundtrack to HBO’s Six Feet Under, Six Feet Under, Vol. 2: Everything Ends. The track was written during soundchecks on the bands European tour, and was recorded the day after they returned to New York. Their song “Evil” was featured in season one, episode five of hit show Grey’s Anatomy.
Our Love to Admire era (2006-)
In late March 2006, drummer Sam Fogarino confirmed that the band were back in the studio working on new material. In an interview with Pitchfork, Fogarino stated “[the process is] moving right along where I think it should…we’re all pretty much on fire about it”. Fogarino also dispelled rumours that the band had signed to major label Interscope, but also confirmed that they would be leaving Matador in search of a new label. An update to their website in June confirmed that the band had been working on the follow-up since the turn of the year, but did not confirm a name for the album or comment on the mounting speculation that they were imminently to sign to a major label. On August 14, it was widely reported that Interpol had signed for Capitol Records, a fact confirmed by Matador on September 1 in a press release on their website.
The band toured Europe, Canada and the US playing small venues and experimenting with new material. On April 23, 2007 it was revealed that the album would be released on July 10, 2007, and the following Wednesday the band posted a message to their official Messageboard, revealing that the album was entitled Our Love to Admire. Throughout Spring and early Summer there was constant speculation that the record had been leaked, with fans crowding message boards and the band’s last.fm page requesting details and confirmation of the leak. Despite this groundswell of anticipation, the record remarkably remained out of the public eye until June 21, when an unknown source leaked the album in full. Despite the leak, the album secured an impressive #4 debut on the Billboard Top 200 Albums Chart.
Our Love to Admire represents a departure for the band, being both the first record they have recorded in New York City (at The Magic Shop and Electric Lady Studios), and the first time they have included keyboards in the arrangements from the start of the songwriting process. As a result, the album is more atmospheric and diverse than its predecessors, with fewer tracks in a similar vein to Slow Hands and Evil, and some experimental songs such as Lighthouse. The band plan to tour the album extensively, beginning with the summer festival circuit throughout the United States and Europe. Our Love to Admire was released in the UK on July 9th on Parlophone, on July 10th in the United States on Capitol, and in Japan on July 11 on EMI Music Japan.