NME Face Overdose Stroke Threat

NME's obsession with toff-rock popsters The Strokes could soon backfire, GQ editor Dylan Jones suggested this week.

"NME's latest incarnation is its most energetic for ages- and its sales are up to 72,443," the media commentator told the Guardian.

"But one gets the impression it could all crumble to nothing if The Strokes decided not to make another record."

His concerns were echoed by two NME readers' letters in the latest issue, one complaining about 'the blatant bias towards the Strokes' and the other, the magazine's decision to run a 'Strokes Week' special issue.

"I am a happy NME subscriber yet I fear I am about to lose the NME I once loved," said Matt Pyne.

""'Where-' you may ask- Up The Strokes' arse, that's where."

The Strokes' blue-blooded pedigree is also strikingly at odds with the bands who once took NME's circulation past 250,000, a fact highlighted by the Guardian several months ago.

"New York's hottest guitar band for aeons weren't formed in CBGBs," the paper pointed out.

"But the Swiss private finishing school L'Institut Le Rosey, where Albert Hammond Junior and Julian Casablancas met." (Guardian)
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