Julian Casablancas
Phrazes For The Young

On August 27, 2001, "Is This It," the debut album by the Strokes, was released. After the third album, the band took a long break that continues to this day, so the group's leader decided, exactly 8 years and a few months after that dazzling debut, to release a solo album titled "Phrazes For The Young." The album consists of eight tracks in which all the strengths and limitations of the "young" Casablancas' songwriting can be found. Anyone who loved the Strokes will find themselves decidedly puzzled when listening to this lp, as this work goes beyond the bounds of garage rock that the 5 New Yorkers had accustomed us to. In this record, Julian Casablancas has given space to every bizarre idea he had in mind, playing with instruments and musical genres, creating an extremely varied work, especially when compared to the homogeneity of the records recorded with the band.

Casablancas, surely aware of this, starts the CD with "Out Of Blue" the track that most closely resembles the sound of his old band. Already in this song, the characteristics of his type of writing are noticeable: the great melodic inventiveness, the ability to find killer choruses (though sometimes a bit slick), and the care in arrangements, but at the same time, the limitation of a standardized writing made of verse and chorus, often with the addition of a somewhat freakish middle eight, is also quite evident. But Julian's skill lies in distracting the listener from this limitation through very elaborate and varied arrangements and thanks to a song structure, although not very varied, designed to enhance its strengths. As mentioned in "Phrazes For The Young," the attention to arrangements reaches maniacal levels, the songs are built on various sound layers, and most of the time, the result is excellent. It ranges from the 80s keyboards of "11th Dimension", to the sampled flutes of "Glass" complete with a baroque solo, even reaching the introduction of a trumpet in "Tourist". But this heterogeneity is noticeable not only in the arrangements but also in the multiplicity of musical styles he dabbles in; there's the blues in 12 bars of "4 Chords of Apocalypse" complete with psychedelic keyboards of the chorus, the folk of white American tradition in "Ludlow St," with its steampunk atmospheres dictated by the long intro performed with synthesizers, up to the electro-rock barrages of "River of Breaklights".

As mentioned above, the limitation of this CD is the predictability of the song structures, but probably aware of this, Casablancas, instead of venturing into territories unfit for him, bets everything on what he knows how to do best, which is writing choruses that remain imprinted from the first listen. To prove this, in almost all the verses preceding the refrains, Julian always places an odd number of measures, 9 if not 10, precisely to magnify the power of his melodies and to create a sort of suspension that resolves in the chorus. In conclusion, "Phrazes For The Young" is a valid album that contains many complex and interesting elements within it but at the same time manages to be immediate, which in the end is an excellent result.