the MARZONYEAH shuffle - "Reptilia" by The Strokes
It’s crazy how music can trigger memories, old feelings, and dormant, everlasting emotions. I recently (manually / painstakingly) ported over my “MarzonYEAH!” playlist, basically my master playlist made up of songs that I loved over the years and still love, from my local iTunes library to my Spotify account, and shuffling this playlist brought me back to those moments in my life that I discovered them, or memories of listening to them. For this series, I plan to write as often as I can, chosen by pressing Shuffle on the playlist. Each post would be about my experience with the songs and a little analysis with a cover to accompany the post. I’m not going to talk too much about lyrics, since, weirdly, that isn’t what I listen for in a song. I’m into chord progressions, melodies, basically whatever the musicians are doing that makes me conjure up some sort of emotion. Lyrics don’t always do that, but I will be sure to talk about it if they do. (You can find lyrical analysis on the Genius pages, so I’ll defer to those.) I’ll try to break down these little features into sections as best I can! I highly encourage you to listen to the song on repeat while reading this!
MarzonYEAH playlist on Spotify: https://spoti.fi/3bmmlB4
Lyrics: https://genius.com/The-strokes-reptilia-lyrics
CHORD PROGRESSIONS
Key of B minor
Verses: Bm - E [i - IV]
Chorus: Bm - F#m - G - A - G - A - F#m - Bm [i - v - VI - VII - VI - VII - v - i]
MY LISTENING EXPERIENCE(S)
Circa 2007 babyyyyyyyyyyyy
I began piano lessons when I was 7 years old, and in order to impress the cuties in school, I decided to pick up and learn guitar a few years later, in the summer between 5th and 6th grade. In that time, I was still rocking out to my brother’s copy of Linkin Park’s second album, Meteora. In middle school, my parents would allow me to stay up and watch Saturday Night Live with them, and that’s where I saw and heard The Strokes for the first time.
They were just so freakin cool, sporting long hair, with a casualness to their performance that I so badly wanted to emulate. The Strokes played the wild, rifftacular “Juicebox” and poppy “You Only Live Once” of their 2006 new album First Impressions Of Earth. That first impression struck a huge chord with me, as I bought that album and tried to learn every single note of all the songs. Apparently, this album isn’t as well regarded as their previous efforts, put I was all in on it.
It wasn’t until I bought their first two albums that I heard “Reptilia” off their second album, Room On Fire, that I really fell in love with the band. This song and its simple, catchy hook was on infinite repeat as I attempted to play along with it on my first electric guitar and amp that my parents bought for me in the summer of 2006.
They also got me a Wii and Guitar Hero 3 in Christmas 2007, exposing me to a whole new world of classic and modern rock. GH3 included “Reptilia” on its soundtrack, and was a common choice at my high school parties AKA video game gatherings of like 2 or so of my friends after school.
THE SONG
(NOTE: I’ll be using the Spotify timecodes to denote exact moments in the song!)
The structure of this song was unique to me during my formative music-listening years. I was used to Verse 1 - Chorus - Verse 2 - Bridge/Solo - Chorus, but “Reptilia” coasts on its verse for a full minute, then switches into the chorus, but doesn’t go into a second verse right away, rather Solo - Verse 2 - Chorus. It had been done before, but my young ears were impressed and was one of the few songs that let me know it’s okay to deviate from traditional structure.
The verses alternate between the minor i and Major IV chords, with the main riff/melody accompanying the whole time. Usually in a minor scale, the Four chord is a minor one, but The Strokes decide to augment the 6th note of the scale (in this case, the G to a G#), so that the Four chord is now an E Major chord! It is this small switch that turns this song from a dour song into a more interesting, alternating between sad and happy emotions jam. Imagine how depressing this song would be if both of the verse chords were minor! Oh no!
The rhythm guitar (the one playing the chords) and bass guitar drop out when Julian Casablancas (the singer) begins singing (0:42). The bass comes back after two cycles of the main riff for two cycles of their own (0:54), before the rhythm guitar re-enters and re-energizes the song (1:06). At this point, Casablancas begins to hit/yell notes in his higher register, and the verse crescendoes into the chorus, when the lead guitar (the guitar playing the main melody) switches into harmonic intervals, with the lower note playing the root note of the chord, while the higher note plays that root’s third but an octave higher. (So it’d be the 11th of the note - the chorus would so so much less interesting if the interval was just a 3rd!)
Again, the instruments except for the now-rhythm guitar cut out at the beginning of the chorus (1:19), the bass and drums join in on the fun (1:25), and to put a cherry on top, the now-lead guitar plays a melody full of peaks and valleys (1:31) throughout the chorus. The respective melodies of the lead and bass guitars are genius, in that the former starts off at a higher note and plays a mostly-descending melodic line, and the bass begins lower and ascends through its phrase. They only meet to play the same notes (G - A - G - A) in the middle of the chorus, then continue on their journeys. It’s like a two kids playing on a see-saw, distributing their weight to balance at the same height, before inevitably collapsing to one of the sides. Albert Hammond, Jr., playing the lead guitar at this moment, picks a melody reminiscent of a Bach line over all this.
With the three guitars playing completely different melodies accompanying Julian’s vocals, you would think that it would sound harmonically horrifying when they’re all stacked on top of each other, but the cacophony matches the theme of the lyrics. Hammond Jr.’s guitar line gets a little lost in the mix, as drummer Fabrizio Moretti intensifies his pattern, and all instruments and Julian crescendo into the guitar solo.
The lead/rhythm guitars switch once more (1:55), with Hammond Jr. going back to his verse rhythm line, and lead guitarist Nick Valensi shredding a triplet-filled variation on his main melody theme. The other instruments lay back and let Valensi have his shine in the spotlight.
Mirroring the moment when Julian began singing in the first verse, only the lead guitar (that just played the solo) cuts out (2:18), then comes back in during the crescendo/screaming. The band plays the chorus once more (2:55), repeating the beautiful madness until their outro.
CLOSING THOUGHTS
“Reptilia” remains one of my favorite songs by The Strokes, since it highlights their skill in using opposing melodies (i.e. the choruses) and rock sensibilities. I still love to play that lead guitar line in the chorus and jam out to this song. Casablancas’ switching from seemingly-apathetic into roaring vocals also make this song a dynamically fun one to sing!
Their 2011 album, Angles, was an important one in my life, as it came during my senior year of high school (similar to how “The Hellcat Spangled Shalalala” affected that year, too). The album that followed, Comedown Machine, was released in 2013 to much indifference. This Friday, April 10, sees their first full album release since 2013, and you know for sure I’m gonna be playing The New Abnormal on repeat all weekend!