The Strokes on stage at The O2, London, on October 6.
The Strokes on stage at The O2, London, on October 6.
The first sound at The O2 on Tuesday night was “Lonely in the Future,” a song from Reality Awaits, and by the time the band reached “Reptilia” the room had stopped waiting for permission to lose it. It was The Strokes’ first UK show in more than three years, the opening night of two in London, and it ended with “Last Nite,” the song they had left out of their New York homecoming four days earlier.
That contrast tells you how this tour is being run. The Strokes are 33 shows into six months on the road, touring a seventh album, missing a founding guitarist and still treating their own set list as something to toy with. In Queens they withheld the hit. In London they played it second from last, then closed with “Ode to the Mets.”
What The Strokes Played at The O2
According to NME’s review, the London set ran to 23 songs. It mixed six tracks from Reality Awaits with the catalogue fans came for: “Reptilia,” “The Adults Are Talking,” “Heart in a Cage,” “Hard to Explain,” “Automatic Stop,” “New York City Cops,” “Juicebox,” “You Only Live Once,” “Meet Me in the Bathroom,” “Someday” and “Under Control.”
The new songs were spread through the night rather than bunched together: “Lonely in the Future” as the opener, then “Dine N’Dash,” “Going Shopping,” “Going to Babble On,” “Tyrants of the Mellow Moon” and “Gratisfaction.” There was also a cover of Blonde Redhead’s “This Is Not” just before the closing run of “Last Nite” and “Ode to the Mets.”
NME singled out a few moments. Julian Casablancas delivered parts of “Gratisfaction” with “a Dylan rasp,” “New York City Cops” came out “thrashy,” and “Take It or Leave It” was “incendiary.” Phone torches went up across the arena for “Call It Fate, Call It Karma,” “Under Control” and the closer.
A Room Lit Like a Jukebox
The staging was simple and effective: three towers of lights beaming down on the band, which NME said “might resemble those of an industrial-sized jukebox.” It suits a band whose set is essentially a greatest-hits machine with new records slotted into it, and it frames the rhythm section and guitars rather than a light show for its own sake.
Casablancas was in a playful mood. “If you want us to never play a song, request it,” he told the crowd, according to NME, comparing himself to the Hulk feeding on the audience’s rage. He announced a mid-verse attempt at a Walton Goggins impression during “Going Shopping,” and at one point turned to drummer Fabrizio Moretti to ask: “You like that old-time rock’n’roll, Fab?”
Bassist Nikolai Fraiture spoke to the crowd about the band’s earliest London gigs, a reminder that the UK took to The Strokes early, long before the arenas. For a band that last played Britain at All Points East in 2023, according to NME, the gap was long enough to make the reunion feel like an event.
The Guitarist Who Was Not There
The biggest change on stage was a missing member. Guitarist Nick Valensi is on what NME called a “temporary break,” and Longwave’s Steve Schiltz stood in for him in London. Consequence reported that Valensi “departed from the band in a touring capacity earlier this year” and did not rejoin them for the New York show.
The Strokes’ sound has always been built on the interplay between two guitars, Valensi’s and Albert Hammond Jr.’s, so a substitute is not a small thing. On the evidence of both reviews, though, the band have adjusted. Consequence described Casablancas as “really bringing it” despite this being “their 33rd show in six months,” and NME’s account suggests a band loose enough to enjoy the songs rather than one going through the motions.
Queens First, London Second
The London shows came four days after the band’s homecoming in New York. On Friday, October 2, The Strokes played Flushing Meadows Corona Park in Queens, supported by Beach House, TV on the Radio and Fcukers, Consequence reported. The show was introduced by Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and Senator Bernie Sanders also appeared on stage.
The New York set featured five songs from Reality Awaits, with Consequence naming “Going to Babble On” as the one that “hits the hardest,” describing it as “a vintage Strokes tune made more urgent and strange by Casablancas’ auto-tuned croons.” “Heart in a Cage” also “absolutely ripped.” What it did not include was “Last Nite.”
Leaving out the band’s best-known song in their home city and then playing it in London is consistent with Casablancas’ joke about requests. It also shows a band confident enough in the new material, and in its audience, to make the set list a little unpredictable.
Reality Awaits and the Rick Rubin Sessions
The tour is carrying Reality Awaits, released in July. It is The Strokes’ seventh studio album and their first new music since 2020’s The New Abnormal, according to Music Feeds, which reported that it was recorded in Costa Rica with producer Rick Rubin and finished in sessions around the world. The singles so far are “Going Shopping” and “Falling Out of Love.”
On the road, the record is holding its own. Six of its songs made the London set, and they sat comfortably beside the Is This It and Room on Fire material rather than stalling the room. That is a harder trick than it sounds for a band whose debut still defines how people hear them.
The Rest of the European Run
London was the start of a European arena leg that runs to the end of October. When the tour was announced in April, Ultimate Classic Rock listed nine more dates after The O2, with Fat White Family and Alex Cameron supporting in Europe:
- October 11: Ziggo Dome, Amsterdam.
- October 13: PSD Bank Dome, Düsseldorf.
- October 15: Uber Arena, Berlin.
- October 17: Unipol Arena, Bologna.
- October 20: Palau Sant Jordi, Barcelona.
- October 22: Accor Arena, Paris.
- October 25: Utilita Arena, Newcastle.
- October 26: Co-op Live, Manchester.
- October 28: 3Arena, Dublin.
That gives UK fans outside London two more chances, in Newcastle and Manchester, before the band finish the leg in Dublin. The same announcement confirmed that Reality Awaits is released through Cult Records and RCA Records. It also set out the summer that got the band here: Bonnaroo in June, Outside Lands in August, Summer Sonic in Tokyo and Osaka, then Shaky Knees in Atlanta and Sea.Hear.Now in Asbury Park in September. A run like that is how a band arrives at an arena in London sounding this match-fit.
Where The Strokes Go Next
The London run was booked for two nights at The O2, and the band have already announced the next leg. On October 6, the day of the first London show, The Strokes confirmed four Australian dates for February 2027, Music Feeds reported:
- Saturday, February 13: Brisbane Entertainment Centre, Brisbane.
- Tuesday, February 16: Rod Laver Arena, Melbourne.
- Wednesday, February 17: Rod Laver Arena, Melbourne.
- Saturday, February 20: Centennial Park, Sydney, the first announced show in the new Sydney Summertime series.
Courtney Barnett and Promiseland support on all dates. Promiseland, the project of Johann Rashid, is signed to Casablancas’ Cult Records. The shows will be the band’s first Australian headline dates since a sold-out run in 2022, following a 2026 that has already taken in North America, Japan, Coachella, Bonnaroo, Outside Lands and Summer Sonic.
Long tours with a changed line-up tend to define a band’s next few years, and big arena returns have been a theme of the autumn, with Oasis adding six nights at Knebworth to their own schedule. For The Strokes, the question after London is not whether the songs still land. It is whether Nick Valensi’s break ends before Australia.
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