The Strokes can play anything. They could play 'Thriller,' and it would just sound like 'Thriller' as played by the Strokes.

Now, the good of business is put above anything else, as corporations have become the new ruling body. Most decisions seem to be made like ones of a medieval king: whatever makes profit while ignoring and repressing the truth about whatever suffering it may cause (like pop music, for that matter).

Vanity can easily overtake wisdom. It usually overtakes common sense.

The artistic element of Manhattan has kind of moved to Brooklyn. Has it changed it? Yeah. Has it ruined it? I would say no. It is what it is. I say better that than an urban war zone.

The way Lou Reed wrote and sang about drugs and sex, about the people around him - it was so matter-of-fact.

I don’t shake at the site of alcohol anymore. I don’t feel the need for it. If anything I’ll get stoned. I always told myself if it got to the point that it was affecting my songwriting and music that I’d stop. And it did get to the point.

It was 100,000 years before we figured out what to do with fire. Imagine cavemen, sitting in front of a fire, eating raw meat for 100 thousand years.