CRX played The Troubadour Sep. 17; photo Amanda de Cadenet
The Strokes are one of the last veritable institutions in rock music (You can fight me on this, I know I’m right). As such, people actually know the names of the dudes in the band, not just the guy up front, which means that no matter what successful side project or solo record they do, they will always be referred to as a member of said band.
As I watched The Strokes guitarist Nick Valensi’s new band, CRX, at the sold-out Troubadour on Saturday night, I couldn’t help but make comparisons to his other group; a submission to human nature and our hunt for familiarity, which Valensi and CRX alternately played around with, and discarded, over the course of the show.
Valensi is the last member of the The Strokes to dip his toe in the side-project water, launching the band with a website and social media accounts at the beginning of August. Always appearing the most content to just stick with his main gig, it was the lack of touring behind 2013’s Comedown Machine that made Valensi antsy to get back on stage. Piecing together talented musicians from other bands (Darian Zahedi and Jon Safely from the Reflections, Richie Follin from Guards, and Ralph Alexander from The Dose), Valensi formed CRX.
“Ways To Fake It,” the lead single from New Skin (out Oct. 28), was all I had to go off of prior to the show. It’s pop-y, it’s Strokes-y, it’s got one of Valensi’s classic, angular, eighth-note riffs, and that interlocking guitar sound that will make you question if Albert Hammond Jr. is on the track.
But before CRX took the stage, opening act, The Gloomies’ lead singer warned, “It’s gonna get a lot louder,” and he was right. The opening heft of “Broken Bones” rattled the wall I was leaning on, while “Unnatural” rode in on a locomotive lick that reminded me of a sinister, mutant version of the “Peter Gunn Theme” ostinato. As if it wasn’t clear enough already that CRX goes heavier than anything the Strokes have done, “Monkey Man” actually started a mosh pit.
CRX is a tight band, and Valensi proved himself a capable singer and convincing frontman. Whether hitting falsetto notes and crooning “Let it go baby, let it go,” on the muscular “Give It Up,” or letting his voice passionately fray just enough at the edges as he sang “I don’t know what to make of it/When everyone is faking it,” during the closer, “Walls,” he showed he’s doing his own thing. Even the power-pop songs, like the mainstream, radio-friendly “Anything,” or the jittery groove of “One Track Mind,” are kept out of Strokes territory by Valensi’s avoidance of Julian Casablancas’ detached, answering-machine bit. The bottom line is, every song has Valensi’s familiar, Epiphany Riviera sound that the crowd of fans in Strokes t-shirts was greatly appreciative of, but other than that, CRX is it’s own animal.
Perhaps most important to me, as a longtime Strokes fan who, full disclosure, has referred to Room on Fire as life-changing on several occasions, is that Valensi is having a damn good time. “Well shit that was fun,” he yelled before closing out the set, and you knew he meant it after the electrifying, jammed-out display that came prior. Valensi showed more enthusiasm at the Troubadour than he has at a Strokes gig in years, willingly playing the guitar hero by thrusting his axe into the crowd as he soloed, seeming to enjoy the shouts of “We love you Nick,” that came after nearly every song, and even letting a head-banging kid that snuck on stage jam out with him for a little bit.
That’s the thing about these bands we hold so dear. We love that they make music for us, and if side projects and solo careers are what they need to still love it too, so be it. We just want to see those familiar faces, and when the music is this good, it’s even sweeter. “We’ll see you next time, right?” Valensi asked before leaving the stage. Judging by the way fans were frantically fighting over the setlist, I would say that’s a safe bet.