Stroke'd!

Rock'n'roll, like good sex, should do a few things. It should leave you dizzy, breathless, exhausted, blissed-out, exhilarated and with the feeling of one who has felt, for a moment, lifted out of themselves and into something bigger. Kinda like seeing God.
If that’s the criteria that we shall measure our rock by, then The Strokes' appearance at Seattle's Seahawks Exhibition Centre was everything a good rock show-cum-religious experience should be.
Despite being stuck in a cavernous hall that was well below sold-out status, the New York rock-revival standard-bearers lined the smallish crowd up against the wall and machined gunned 'em down with a perfectly balanced set of sexy, raw New Wave-inspired tunes from Is This It and new one Room On Fire. While media profiles and haters alike tend to focus on the band’s fashion sense, background and throwback sound, more than anything else these guys are pros. Tight, focused, almost machine-like in their efficiency. And, while some would criticize the lack of onstage action (with the exception of Julian Casablancas' wandering about and Albert Hammond's bobbing 'fro action), I'll take the Strokes' lean songs and razor-sharp delivery over a thousand furiously pogoing poseurs any day.
Openers and Southern preacher-spawn Kings Of Leon set the tone with a raw loose set of CCR-ish boogie-rock. The band, all moustasches, leather jackets and tight trousers, fell on the Philistinistic crowd like a Led balloon, but still proved to be a hearty appetizer for the main course
The Strokes swaggered out to the Clash's "Clampdown" and kicked straight into Room On Fire "ballad" Under Control, which dripped with Casablancas' trademark East Village ennui and Hammond and Nick Valensi's serpentine guitar licks. Despite nursing a throat ailment (which manifested itself a couple of times during the show), Casablancas was the focal point, bantering easily (albeit nonsensically) between songs, swearing like a sailor, and diving into the crowd (twice) during new single "12:51". And then there was The Moment. Every great show has a Moment, when everything comes together to make your mouth drop open slackly, your fists to clench involuntarily and the hairs on the back of your neck stand at attention. On this night, it was during "Reptilia" a song that pretty much embodies the Strokes' "sound": the tight groove of Nikolai Fraiture's bass and Fab Moretti's airtight drumming meeting the frenzied duel guitar attack, all propelled into Mach speeds by Casablancas’ vocal explosion. As the angular front man leaned into the mic to beg the crowd to "Please don't slow me down if I'm going too fast!” and the strobes bathed the crowd and stage in a flash of blinding white, The Moment hit me and I rocked back on my heels like a Pentecostal at a old time revival. Saved by rock'n' roll. Saved by the Strokes.