The Strokes Clean Up For Their New Album

The Strokes have quite drinking and smoking to record their new album.

The "Last Night" band are recording their fifth album in New York, and have cleaned up their act so they can concentrate on the new material, according to guitarist Albert Hammond Jr.'s father.

"They're back, strong and mature, a lot of them have quit smoking and drinking and all the good things that come with rock 'n' roll, or whatever people think comes with rock 'n' roll," Albert senior said.

Albert also acknowledged the band almost split when they were recording last album Angles - with singer Julian Casablancas taking himself out of sessions at one point - but relations between the group are now better than ever: "Fortunately they do love each other, and they have people around them who love them. Obviously we all take the wrong roads at times, especially when you're young. And some of us never come out of that road and end up in another world. The good thing about them is that, as I said, all these people that loved them and they loved each other and they finally realized that they had something going that was good."

Gallery: The Strokes Clean Up For Their New Album

The Strokes Start a New Album

The Strokes have started work on their next album.

The New York band are in the studio in New York working on the follow up to last years Angles, with producer Gus Oberg. Gus worked on some of the tracks on Angles - which was largely self produced - and has previously worked with guitarist Albert Hammond Jr. on his solo material.

The "Hard to Explain" band - which also includes Nick Valensi, Fabrizio Moretti, Julian Casablancas and Nikolai Fraiture - have previously said they wanted to record a quick follow up to their fourth album. "We have songs that you can tell are gonna be good ones that we're all excited to play," Albert said.

The group took a long break between third album First Impressions of Earth in 2006 and Angles and Nikolai admitted there was a strange feeling when they first met up to record . "When you get back together there was a lot of weird energy flowing around. There are different dynamics in the group in different ways," he said.

Click to continue reading The Strokes Start a New Album

Gallery: The Strokes Start a New Album