“Why does someone else always look like the lead singer in the photos?” says Casablancas as he, Valensi and Moretti review potential publicity photos for their US tour. He’s right. Someone else is always in the center, in focus. Yet he’s the one who writes the songs, the one who drafted Hammond and early childhood friend Fraiture into the group, the one who gets on Romano’s case the most during rehearsals. It’s his personality—witty, wary, yet with an honesty that can slip into cockiness—that has been generalized as the personality of the entire band. There are other aspects of the press that the Strokes still haven’t figured out. When Valensi says, “I’m interested in getting laid and doing drugs as much as the next guy, but we also have a really good work ethic,” he doesn’t realize the immediate journalistic impulse is to blow that up into a giant pullquote.

The London show is in Heaven, a spot that is usually a gay disco. The show yesterday in Colchester was in what used to be a church. Like they say, it takes all kinds. Tonight is the Strokes’ biggest show so far in what is sure to be a year of big shows. Supermodels and Pet Shop Boys are on the guest list. Tickets that originally sold for £8.50 are now being scalped for £100. The Strokes come through in the clutch. If you’ve ever seen a good rock show, I’ll spare you the details, but man, the Strokes are fun. You should see them, a mix of controlled mayhem and boogie-oogie-woogie. Backstage Hammond is introduced to Jack Rovner, the head of the Strokes’ label RCA, who has flown in for the show. Once Hammond realizes who he is, he gives him a hug and says, “Welcome to the family,” even though normal logic would have the exchange going the other way around.

Later at the after-party in Heaven’s Powder Room, two boys in denim jackets are trying to persuade the wait staff to take off the trance and put on the Stones, but they are told the club “only has gay music.” It’s packed with music journalists, the band’s tech crew, scenesters and autograph seekers. As per the orders of an unknown individual outside of the band’s management team, two club security guards follow Casablancas around the room all night. They’re not stoic Secret Service types (they drink and hit on girls like Casablancas does), but wherever he goes, they’re right behind him. (When told about it the next morning, Valensi says “Last night’s crowd was the nicest of the entire tour. We could have used bodyguards in Dublin, Glasgow, Manchester.”) Outside the main room that is a bit much for him, Moretti politely humors a blonde girl with a backless shirt who is on some Keanu shit in what she thinks is consoling him about his hand, telling “You’ve got the power. You’re the one.” But she’s drunk. Everyone’s drunk. Because the Strokes are an American band and when they come to your town, you’ve got to party down.