I think first heard Interpol’s PDA on last year’s Precipiate EP, but I don’t really remember. It wasn’t exactly a red letter day. The buzz out of New York (that sweet nexus from which all buzz flows) is that they are the next NYC band in line to save rock and roll. Personally, I didn’t know rock and roll needed saving — and I tend to keep a fairly close eye on exactly which musical genres need saving and which do not. Country music, educated hip-hop, torch singing. . . these genres need a hero in an almost Bonnie Tylerian sense of the phrase. Rock and roll is doing just fine. . thank you very much. In any case, even if rock and roll did need saving, I would put my trust in a more steady hand, perhaps Elvis Costello, before I would ask Interpol to respond to the signal flare.

It’s not that they aren’t a good band, they just aren’t qualified to masquerade as the saviors of anything, much less an entire genre of music. The band’s boosters will say that Interpol doesn’t WANT to save rocknroll, but I beg to differ. Any band that wears a uniform (black mod suits with red shirts) and features a bassist with a Flock of Seagulls haircut is out to save something, and if it’s not their record contract then the next most-likely candidate is ’sweet lady rawk’.

Although they’ve nailed the NYC hipster-mod thing down to a sweet science, the band that Interpol is usually paired with is Joy Division, but I think that is only because the lead singer can sometimes mimic the baritone of Ian Curtis. A vocal register is hardly a sound basis for comparision, and judging from their newest album Turn On The Bright Lights, I’d offer up Bedhead, My Dad Is Dead, a shoegazing version of New Order, or even a less inventive Mercury Rev as candidates for the “we spawned Interpol” award. not that any of those bands would show up to accept it.

Be that as it may, ChrisFromNewYork was in town last weekend, his friends Calla were opening for Interpol at the (Club) 9:30 (Club), and ChrisFromNewYork made sure that we were on the guest list.

(I once saw a bumper sticker that said “A bad day at the golf course is better than a good day at the office”, and while I can’t fully endorse golf as a good way to spend a Friday night, what with the possibilty of imminent death by four-iron, I have a fair bit of experience in the ‘going to rock shows’ aspect of Friday night, and I can say without reservation that “A bad night at the rock show is better than a good day at the office”, especially a free rock show.)*|

It was in that spirit that we four (Chris, John, Ivan and I) braved the wintery mix and trundled on down to “the rock”. I’m always ready for a good show, and I even enjoy a large crowd, but I was ill-prepared for the mass of clove-smoking psuedo-hipsters who had chosen to pack the 9:30 that night. The lot of them were dressed in the standard suburban goth/retro-mod uniforms — these kids came to see and be seen, and they wore their dis-affected aloof attitude and dismissive stares while cooling rating other audience members and summarily rejecting the uncool with a grim efficiently that can only be rivaled by white robots from the future.

Did I mention that they were smoking cloves? No self-respecting person over the age of 18 should ever smoke clove cigarettes. That’s the sort of thing you experiment with when you are in high school and then dismiss almost immediately — like paint huffing or joining the Republican party.

Even ChrisFromNewYork was not hip enough to stand firm against that onslaught, and he’s in a band in New York for pete’s sake, so we ditched the indier-than-thou crowd and made our way backstage to the Calla dressing room. The remainder of what transpired is standard backstage stuff — lots of people walking around trying to get stuff signed or whatever — so I won’t bore you with the details. Let’s just say it was simultaneously as tedious and exhilarating as you are imagining, but if you want the gory details, just email me.