The Walkmen

One Liner: Strokesian rock and roll 

Wikipedia Genre: indie rock, post-punk revival

Home: New York City

Poster Position: 3 (8)
Weekend One Only.  

Sunday at 3:15.

Thoughts:   This is an interesting band in that I think I know who they are, but I honestly don't know them at all.  Lead singer Hamilton Leithauser was here in 2017 and I thought his solo stuff was pretty solid.  Their song "We've Been Had" was in a commercial for Saturn cars, of all things, and feels like it was in some movie around then as well.

The members all grew up in the DC area, and played in several bands together over the years, before they all moved to Harlem and figured out this band.  Previously they had been part of bands called Jonathan Fire*Eater (which is an awful band name) and The Recoys (which is a pretty cool band name).  They built a studio in Harlem with money borrowed from family members, and then started pushing out some Strokes-ian garage and indie rock.  The debut album, 2002's Everyone Who Pretended to Like Me is Gone, included that "We've Been Had" song, but for some reason is listed as a 2009 album on Spotify.  7.9 million streams.

The piano licks definitely make that an outlier song from their catalog.  Much of their music sounds kind of like Paul Westerberg/The Replacements.  Their biggest tune is off of the second album, Bows + Arrows, called "The Rat."  36.4 million streams.

There is their Strokes sound.  I literally don't think I've ever heard that song before, and yet people online act like it was the defining sound on the 2000's.  Weird.  "You've got a nerve to be asking a favor!"  They noted that the commercial sell out helped pay for this entire album.  I have to say that I love the drums on that song.  The popularity of this second album got them a gig playing on the Fox show The O.C.

No new music since 2016, which seems kind of like a bummer.  According to Wikipedia, they went on hiatus in 2013, only coming back together in 2023 for The Revenge Tour.  But I guess since I don't know these songs in the first place, then its like they're all new albums!  Not a lot of streams after those first two albums, but "heaven" from 2012's album of the same name is the outlier as the second-most streamed tune in their catalog.  29.6 million streams,

Solid tune.  Again, I'm feeling the Replacements with the vocals, and the Strokes with the backing music.  This song was used as the closing song in the finale of the TV series How I Met Your Mother.  I've never seen a single episode of that show.

I'd go check this out for sure.  Rock and Roll, baby.