Julian Casablancas + the Voidz – Tyranny

You know Julian Casablancas as the frontman for the Strokes and now on his second solo album he wants to let you get to know him better. He is divulging every inch of his body and soul on Tyranny through this musical journey which seems like an artist trying to find himself. The style of the music varies from track to track and from punk to metal to lo-fi rock. The compulsion to make radio friendly songs or even make commercially successful music was definitely not the reason these twelve tracks were recorded. That is as obvious as the nose on your face when you arrive at song four, “Human Sadness”, which is an eleven minute ballad. All throughout much of the nicer aspects of the songs are hidden underneath distortion, muffling of vocals and up tempo beats.  It almost seems like he wants to make you work to find things to like about the songs so that if you make it through you demonstrate that you are really invested in what he is doing. Definitely listen to this several times front to back before you make up your mind.