J ulian Casablancas has one mission. Itâs been the driving force behind his music since he co-founded The Strokes in 1997 and still pushes him forward now with The Voidz, his self-proclaimed âprison jazzâ gang. He wants to and has always wanted to take the sounds and styles that live at the more obscure end of musicâs spectrum and usher them into the mainstream. That statement might seem incongruous with the band that made him a global star â the sound of those first Strokes albums is, after all, still being lifted wholesale by bands hoping to follow in their footsteps â but when they first took over the dive bars and tiny venues of New York, then London, then the world, music was in a safe, beige place.
With The Voidz, that aim has never been in doubt. When they first emerged in 2013, they confounded many â especially those expecting Casablancas to continue down the path of his solo album âPhrazes For The Youngâ. Instead, the mulleted misfitsâ debut album âTyrannyâ was an out-of-left-field mix of experimental art-punk and heavily processed robo-vocals that felt like they were playing under an apocalyptic shadow. Its songs rarely spanned less than five minutes and often longer, like the 11-minute âHuman Sadnessâ â still the most beautifully odd and affecting thing Casablancas has made to date. It made things very clear: we werenât in the Mercury Lounge circa 2001 anymore.
A decade on, their fourth record, âLike All Before Youâ, continues that approach, jagged metal riffs pummelling away between vocals Auto-Tuned into a mechanised delivery and melodies and rhythms dripping in Middle Eastern influence. These are largely not the sounds of the mainstream that Casablancas hopes to infiltrate.
âIâd say itâs going pretty well,â he responds when NME asks him to take stock of his mission ahead of the release of The Voidzâs fourth album. Heâs speaking to us over video call from his home in upstate New York â or his âunderground bunker, undisclosed locationâ, as he jokingly puts it â slowly spinning in his chair in front of an aggressively red-and-black patterned wall. He avoids looking at the camera as he holds his phone aloft, gazing off to his right as he thinks. After this long in the music business, heâs realistic about the pace at which he can achieve his goal.
âThe journey of boundary-pushing music being mainstream is a positive, inspiring, artistic featâ
âYou canât just expect things to happen [the way] you want,â he shrugs. âYou always want to put something out and have everyone say, âOh my god, this is the greatest thing of all time! You win the award for greatest thing ever!â In reality, things take a long time, and Iâve always just tried to put my head down and make things that are good.â
The mission that has propelled him forward for nearly 30 years, in his mind, shares similarities with the subject that has often more recently â and from an outside perspective â felt like his true passion. âThe journey of boundary-crossing or boundary-pushing music becoming mainstream is a positive, inspiring, artistic feat that is parallel to truth and history and transparency being in mainstream politics,â he muses. âI think thereâs a correlation between the two in terms of how that gets done and affects the public. The mission is the same on both fronts â Iâm on the music side because I guess thatâs my skill or profession or whatever.â
Politics has long fuelled and circled Casablancasâ art. Four years ago, he launched a short-lived interview series with Rolling Stone called S.O.S. â Earth Is A Mess, in which he spoke to philosophers, politicians, journalists and others about the state of the world. Recent political cycles have seen him throw the weight of The Strokes behind candidates he believes in, like Bernie Sanders, Maya Wiley and Kina Collins, with performances at fundraisers and rallies.
In 2014, he described âTyrannyâ as a protest record, and while he hasnât intentionally approached this new release in a similar light, he says heâd be âhonouredâ if âLike All Before Youâ was considered one. âI donât know if it quite meets the criteria,â he ponders, initially joking that benchmark would be met by âa closed fist on the cover, a bandana covering the faceâ before giving a more serious answer of âinforming and inspiring reality and truth in a rousing wayâ.
Regardless, the idea of protest on different levels âis definitely going throughâ Casablancasâ mind when he sings these songs. âBut I suppose itâs also going through my mind while Iâm walking through my apartment,â he adds. âItâs just what I think about a lot, so it comes out in the songs. Itâs a topic worth getting to the bottom of and trying to inspire others to do the same rather than just ignoring. Thereâs enough art that takes you away.â To him, the âbest artâ confronts you with reality, even if that means âsneaking it in through allegories and analogiesâ.
âLike All Before Youâ does that subtly, beginning with the albumâs title. It was inspired by a conversation with bassist and synth player Jake Bercovici, in which he told Casablancas: âSoon weâll all be crusted and dusted like all before us.â âThe âlike all before usâ part I thought was really cool,â The Voidzâs leader explains. âIt said even more than just that; itâs a way to have perspective. We always think weâre so special and beyond the old ways, but weâre not. I think it helps us avoid the behaviour that we abhor in past generations by knowing that we are the same.â
Politics is woven into every track on the album, but one of its most obvious examples comes in âFlexorcistâ, a bright, hand-clapping, wiry guitar-led Trojan horse of a song. Between the buzzing hooks, Casablancas declares: âWe are free, but weâre not free [â¦] Some might just not be ready for the truth.â
âLet me grab some more coffee,â he replies when NME recites these lines to him, walking through his house, his connection jittering in and out until heâs back in his chair. Settled back in, caffeine in mug, he begins to explain his vision of the truth in two parts. One, he doesnât think many would argue with â âthe idea of the warlord, billionaire entity oppressing and being good at gaining wealth, and the struggle of individuals to gather and group against that type of peopleâ. In the past, the oppressor would have been monarchies and rulers; now, he cites fast food and streaming corporations.
âIf people are going to be affected by superficial advertising and fancy media, then we almost have no hopeâ
The second part, though, he sees people âhaving trouble understanding, in how itâs manifesting in our day-to-day livesâ. âThe main weapon of these âbad guyâ people â billionaires trying to pay no taxes â is distraction,â Casablancas says. âAnd itâs a long, complicated, indirect chain of exploitation, so itâs not really easy to pinpoint whoâs doing what damage. What bums me out is people love to talk on a daily basis about the distractions that are being fed to us and Iâm just so over it and so fed up with it. I donât know if itâs the convenience or the cosiness and the professional fonts of a nice newspaper, or the magical Superman lights of CNN, but the fact we canât unchain ourselves from this song or [stop being] hypnotised by this nonsense is the biggest challenge and biggest confusion I have.â
The musician has ideas for how to break the spell of distraction â many of them, in fact. They range from a âtruth courtâ in which jurors would come to judgements about âevery disputed news story and statement politicians makeâ, to a UN army of âprogressive peopleâ that would, he hopes, make âthe bully powers have a lot harder time doing what they do without repercussionsâ.
âPeople need to grab things by the reins to guide us out of this mess, and the things that are causing the mess are super-coordinated, multi-million dollar operations,â he concludes. âIn terms of promotional muscle, the bad guys are so much more equipped. So itâs going to have to be outside of the financial propaganda means that affect us. And that is the biggest thing that upsets me, because if people are going to be affected by being bombarded with superficial advertising and fancy media, then we almost have no hope. But if people can understand thatâs the thing to avoidâ¦â He trails off and wraps up his spiel, locks eyes with the camera and smiles. âI think thatâs an important, simple, first step that I would flag in an NME article.â
It might seem like Casablancas only started to be spurred on by politics since The Voidzâs formation, or since what he calls his awakening around 2008, but he contests that idea, saying heâs âalways been interested in politics, but I think I didnât really have all of the historical understandingâ. He points to other artists who inspired him earlier in his life and now, like Bob Marley, Bob Dylan and John Lennon. Although the latterâs âpolitical thing wasnât really inspiringâ to him, it did show him politics and music could co-exist.
He nods, too, to songs on The Strokesâ debut album âIs This Itâ as proof of what heâs saying: âIn âNew York City Copsâ and âSomaâ there were political themes⦠âPoliticalâ is a bad word because you think of the Tories and the Republicans â thatâs not really what I mean. Iâm talking about the ideas and values of human beings and how to philosophically combat the gears of power and the people who control things.â Those ideas, he says, were âalways at the core of the musical questâ to the extent that he feels he did âmaybe care more about that than the musicâ.
Given that almost lifelong commitment to getting politics into the ears of a generation of music fans and the themes on âLike All Before Youâ, it would be remiss of NME to let Casablancas go without asking how heâs feeling about the upcoming US presidential election. âNothing,â he replies in a dramatic whisper before adjusting his tone.
âTo be super middle of the road, I would say the vice presidential [running mate] of Kamala Harris, [Tim] Walz â he seems like an honest, decent person. So just for him, I suppose Iâll be sports-rooting for that team more than the other team, but I think theyâre both two sides of the same corporate coin. Emotionally, a woman of colour and all that â sure, letâs just get that out of the way and check that box so we can move forward. But, in terms of what people actually want, neither of the parties offer that â they just have a stranglehold on power.â
In both Casablancasâ continued mission to infiltrate the mainstream and the wider worldâs struggle to survive and defeat the bad guys, thereâs a long path ahead. At least on the former prong, though, he is undeterred. âItâs a tough road, but itâs worth a struggle,â he says. âNo struggle, no progress.â
The Voidzâs new album âLike All Before Youâ is released on September 20 via Cult Records