There has been much speculation over the artwork for Comedown Machine, the Is This It portraits cast as silhouettes could seem like an ominous sign for the future of the band but Albert reassured fans on Twitter last night that whilst it was the end of an era that it was meant to simply represent the end of their cycle at RCA records

“@jakeprice24: @alberthammondjr The Strokes as a band cycle? Or just The Strokes on RCA cycle?”Obviously the RCA cycle

— Albert Hammond, Jr. (@alberthammondjr) March 25, 2013

Check out the scans at the link below.

Gallery: Artwork: Comedown Machine: Album

Yet more Reading festival news for you as NME went backstage with Julian and Jarvis Cocker as well as reviewing their Reading show

Way back in 2002 the Strokes had an official fan club called Alone Together. It ran from 2002 to 2005. In Transit the much beloved DVD was part of the club as was various other goodies including the newsletters.

I’ve previously scanned some pages but now all 8 issues are up in the gallery.

Fan Club: Alone Together Newsletters

A long long time ago in a galaxy far far away Blag Magazine did an interview with Julian Casablancas.  Due to a million different reasons the interview which was conducted in December 2009 was only just shipped out earlier this month.

My copy arrived last week and I finally got around to scanning it.  Obviously its completely out of date by now but the photographs are pretty stunning and if you haven’t read it already its worth a look at.

Magazines : 2011 : Blag Magazine

Interview with Q Magazine (issue date June 2011). Have to say not one of my favourites from this year, think Q were deliberately creating drama to put a depressing spin on things. Hey that is the way the media works though – drama sells and the Strokes do have a tendency to say headline grabbing things, even if they later regret it.

Magazines : 2011 : Q Magazine (Click for full article)