“Someday” by The Strokes

"Someday" is the third and final single from Is This It, the Strokes' 2001 debut, and it's the album at its most wistful. Julian Casablancas wrote it and sings it in that bored, blown-out croon, but underneath the cool the melody is almost sentimental, sweetness sneaking through the shrug.

The guitars of Albert Hammond Jr. and Nick Valensi weave and chatter around each other, bright and tangled, while Nikolai Fraiture's bass bounces and Fabrizio Moretti's drums keep it tight and springy. Gordon Raphael produced it, keeping the sound raw and close, like the band is playing in your living room.

It reached number 17 on the US Modern Rock Tracks chart and 27 in the UK, and its reputation has only grown. Pitchfork put it at 53 on its list of the 200 best songs of the 2000s, and in 2020 Paste and The Independent ranked it eighth and third among the greatest Strokes songs.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.