As the thousands of hipsters ironically packed into MSG you could feel something special would go down as NY heroes The Strokes played their first show in the garden. As the lights went out the crowd was surprised to see Elvis Costello take the stage. "April Fools motherfuckers!" he yelled and then went into a quick three song set of "Radio Radio" "Pump it Up" and "(What's so Funny about) Peace Love and Understanding" Minds were blown. After his set the headliners took the stage. The Strokes have been getting a lot of flack for phoning it in recently at their shows. This wasn't the case tonight...
The crowd went crazy as the band kicked things off with "Is this it" and then went immediately into "Reptillia" Julian was in rare form last night as well. He genuinely felt honored to be playing in MSG. He recalled stories of all the shows he's seen in the venue and awkwardly preached that we should see a basketball game here. Hipsters looked confused.. During "Life is Simple in the Moonlight" Julian jumped into the crowd and finished off that song and "Juicebox" in the middle of the swarming people. When he got back on stage he complained that they were too gentle.. "You're supposed to fucking rip me apart!" One of the highlights of the show was them bringing out Elvis Costello on "Taken for a Fool" in one of the biggest WTF? collaborations I've seen live. They came back for a five song encore which consisted of Julian jumping back in the crowd for "Take it or Leave it" Crowd ripped him apart this time.. After it was all said and done The Strokes made their first MSG show a memorable one. They did something that I've never seen The Strokes do before in that arena.. Look truly humbled to be playing.
01 “Is This It”
02 “Reptilia”
03 “Under Cover Of Darkness”
04 “Hard To Explain”
05 “Last Nite”
06 “Juicebox”
07 “Someday”
08 “You’re So Right”
09 “Under Control”
10 “You Only Live Once”
11 “New York City Cops”
12 “Games”
13 “Whatever Happened”
14 “Taken For A Fool” (w/ Elvis Costello)
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15 “Ask Me Anything”
16 “Modern Age”
17 “Gratisfaction”
18 “I Can’t Win”
19 “Take It Or Leave It”
