The Strokes on meeting each other
Various excepts from the book “Meet me in the Bathroom: Rebirth and Rock and Roll in New York City 2001–2011” by Elizabeth Goodman
“NICK VALENSI: I remember what Julian was wearing the day I met him in middle school: blue jeans and a white button-down shirt. The shirt had the name of his former school on it - which was funny to me, that he wore the uniform from his old school to the first day of his new school. I was thirteen, he was fifteen.
JULIAN CASABLANCAS: We met at orientation at the Dwight School.
FABRIZIO MORETTI: Dwight sucked.
NIKOLAI FRAITURE: Julian was cool even before the band. He was cool from first grade. We went to Friends School, on the Upper East Side. I don't remember meeting him but I remember when our friendship was solidified. We were six or seven. Our school had a water main break. It was in the morning so it was right after class started and everyone had to go home. My parents were working and they couldn't come to pick me up, so Julian told me to come home with him. The water main didn't get repaired for three days so I just stayed over.
FABRIZIO MORETTI: Nikolai was always around. Julian has this very attractive way of being, even on a subconscious level. People run the risk of wanting to bend towards his wishes. And at that time, the way I saw it, Nikolai was the only one who Julian would bend to. That changed, but I remember Nikolai's school got out later than ours, and Julian would wait for what seemed like a long time, for him to come home and just hang out.
NICK VALENSI: Fab was in my grade at Dwight-I didn't have classes with Julian, but I had English and French with Fab.
FABRIZIO MORETTI: Then they found out Nick was actually better at French than they initially graded him so he moved. We were all friends. But I always felt like I was chasing them, like I wasn't cool enough. They would kinda let me in every once in a while. They were thick as thieves, those two. I would try to hang out with them, and it always felt like a privilege when I did.
NIKOLAI FRAITURE: The first time I met Nick, were going to a music store on Forty-Eighth Street, Sam Ash. He was much younger than Julian and I were-he was thirteen and we were fifteen- but then we got home and he played "The Star-Spangled Banner" by Jimi Hendrix and I was like, "Holy shit."
NICK VALENSI: Right away Julian and I started doing music together. He started writing songs basically right away.”
RYAN GENTLES: Those guys all go so far back. Albert knew Jules since they were eight years old. He met Jules when he was eight!
ALBERT HAMMOND JR.: Julian and I went to boarding school together in France.
JULIAN CASABLANCAS: Before Dwight, I was kind of messing up in school as usual so I got sent to the boarding school that my father had gone to and that he loved. I had a roommate who had some video games, Street Fighter II and shit. People would come over and play.
ALBERT HAMMOND JR.: We connected in a way where he was like an older brother. We hung out in his room and played video games, that kind of thing. I was like a little kid to him, even though really, it was only a two-year difference.
JULIAN CASABLANCAS: Albert was a little younger so I wasn't really friends with him then, but he was one of the only other Americans there. I kept a pretty low profile at that school. I mean, it was a pretty big culture shock.
ALBERT HAMMOND JR.: I met Julian and Nikolai first, before I even tried out for the band. We went to Ryan's Daughter and had margaritas. I was never a big drinker. I was more of a stoner in L.A., so I was pretty wasted already, and then they were like, "Let's get forties!" I was like, "You want beer after this?" So we get forties and we're hanging out on the east park, Eighty-something, drunk.
NIKOLAI FRAITURE: Oh yeah, Carl Schurz Park, with the L.A. boy.
ALBERT HAMMOND JR.: It was a fun little bonding experience. Then I went home and threw up everywhere.
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