Three years ago, it seemed like every New York rock band was on the Rapture/Radio 4 wagon, bearing post-disco beats and jagged guitars. Now the New York rock sound is dominated more by room-filling Walkmen-like jangle and Strokes-style bellowing, with maybe just a hint of TV On the Radio's apocalyptic futurism. Or at least that's the sound of The End Of The World, a buzzed-about New York band with a debut LP, You're Making It Come Alive, that chugs, shakes, and screeches like a subway train. And at times—for better and worse—it sounds just as mechanical.
The End Of The World's major asset is lead vocalist Stefan Marolachakis, whose shout-singing resembles that of Julian Casablancas and Hamilton Leithauser. (What is it with these NYC frontmen and their complicated names?) Marolachakis delivers each line as though it were part of a speech that's going to take a while to finish; when he pauses, you can almost hear him reaching for a glass of water. The End Of The World's pounding, Velvet Underground-derived rhythms and snaky guitars sound rote at first, then increasingly hypnotic, and when Marolachakis weaves his woozy croon through the beat, You're Making It Come Alive frequently lives up to its title. On songs like the hustling "Party's Over," The End Of The World creates an electric racket that's similar to Pavement's early singles. It's like someone accidentally recorded an expectedly intense performance in some basement in the middle of nowhere.