One of the band's publicists, Steven Trachtenbroit, had been trying to land the band on the cover of Magnet for quite some time and is excited about having scored it, but I'm wondering, having appeared on the front of nearly every major music magazine, if the novelty and excitement of such coveted exposure has begun to wane?

"It's cool to be on the cover of magazines and stuff, but it's more about letting people know that we're a band," says the soft-spoken Fraiture. "For me it's hard to name a magazine that I would endorse, but, yeah, it's cool that you're on them, and that people hear about your music."

And that music has set the world on fire. But, to say, as is often the case, that the band's music can be distilled into two neatly compartmentalized components is, well, lazy. Most reviews of the band state the obvious: That the band's sound is a mixture of the Velvet Underground and the band Television —Tom Verlaine playing lead guitar for the Velvet's. But, they are much more than that. They are as indebted to these groups, along with Richard Hell and the rest of the late '70's New York post-punk movement as they are to, say, elements of Goth.

"Definitely The Cure; I guess we could say they're Pop-Goth," admits Fraiture. "The Cure is definitely a major influence, not only on our bass lines, but also the style of the tones as well. I really love The Cure."

In short, to hear The Strokes music is to hear the energy and the passion of the city they call home, New York — the threadbare, rawness that lurks in the soul of the Lower Eastside. It's as though you can almost feel the roiling hum of the subway chanting underfoot.

But, even though they call NYC home, the band had to take their 2001 full-length debut, Is This It?, to the UK in order to break the album. By the time they released it here in the States they had already been on the cover of most of the major magazines overseas. The band's popularity rose steadily, eventually landing them in the opening slot for the Rolling Stones.

"It was cool, but it sounds cooler than it actually was," says Fraiture with a wry chuckle of his band's two-night stand with Mick and Keith. "It's like with any other opening act — the crowd was there to see the Rolling Stones. I mean, it was cool. We got to meet them, and they were really cool guys. But, we felt a little out of place. It was two nights of playing HUGE arenas. The immensity of arenas and it was a very strange feeling knowing the Rolling Stones were going to come on right after us. There were so many confused ideas at the same time we didn't know whether or not to be excited about watching the show or not."

As their own career continues to evolve and they anoint other up-and-comers by taking them on the road, The Strokes are trying to deal with their success while maintaining their focus on the craft of songwriting and not pay close attention to what the press has to say.

"I think we place more stress on ourselves than any outside sources," says Fraiture. "I mean, the press places a lot of expectations on what we do, but I wouldn't say that we really need to mitigate any stress. I would say that the stress just exists; it's in an environment of its own, and from time to time we check it out to see what's going on. Otherwise, the pressure comes from us not to fuck anything up. We don't want to get distracted by every single distraction that comes up in this crazy industry."

To combat the distractions all five of The Strokes — singer, Julian Casablancas; guitarist, Nick Valensi; drummer, Fab Moretti; guitarist, Albert Hammond, Jr, and Fraiture maintain a rigorous work schedule.

"It's really hard getting off the road; you just wanna kind of do nothing for a long time," says Fraiture. "The road can really wear you down. And, so, what we try to do it take a few days off and then get back into work mode as quickly as possible. We're in the studio now working on new songs. We enjoy doing it. We just don't want to become complacent."

Complacent? Hardly. This past fall the band released their sophomore follow up, Room On Fire, which they recorded last summer at TMF studios in NYC, so I am amazed to find that they are already in the studio again working on new material.

"At this point, since we just got off the road, so it's just mostly parts that we're messing around with," explains Fraiture. "It's mostly to work on stuff and live our normal lives in New York again. We used to go to the studio a lot, and it helps us return to normality. I think we write music and work on it best in that environment. I mean, sometimes we'll go play darts for, like, half-an-hour, and then play music for the rest of the time so that we're together and focused on the same thing."

Fraiture says The Strokes intend to cultivate themselves as best as they can — to continue to write good songs, and work towards fulfilling their own expectations, and sometimes that in itself can be an enormous challenge.

"The thing is not to fall into all the cliché's, not to start following everything that's been done already, not to become trendy heroin addicts, and, you know, stuff like that," he says. "There have been so many bands that have been through the same exact thing, and so many bands that are still going through the same exact thing as we are, so not to fall into these cliché's is a major step in remaining your own band. You also have to continue to play the type of music you like to play, and to continue to grow. That has always been our primary focus — to continue to grow."