Though the Strokes appeared only a few years ago, their impact cannot be underestimated. Before the five skinny New Yorkers came along, indie music was hardly overburdened with glamour. After catching sight of these confident young men (who could possibly be more confident than Manhattan prep schoolboys?), an entire generation rejected the electronic music that their older siblings enjoyed and picked up guitars.

The Strokes looked slicker than they sounded. Their first album, Is This It? in 2001, was no better than demo quality in everything but the catchy songs. But despite the model girlfriends and adoption by the fashion crowd, Is This It? and their second album, Room on Fire, sold in smaller numbers than the blanket media coverage would suggest. With everyone from the Killers to Arcade Fire grabbing part of the market that once seemed theirs for the taking, First Impressions of Earth is a serious record for the Strokes.

For a start it is a long record. Thirty-five minutes was their previous limit, but this lasts for more than an hour. Unsurprisingly, it feels thinly spread at times. Fear of Sleep and 15 Minutes are not so much unresolved as unwritten. But there are plenty of genuinely exciting tunes here. Though nothing matches the tenderness of Room on Fire’s Under Control, Ask Me Anything, with its plaintive chorus and budget baroque arrangement, gets closest. The unusually unrestrained recent single, Juicebox, is all warped rockabilly attack, while Ize of the World rolls along in the best Strokes style, deceptively relaxed, like a duck that looks serene sitting on the water while its feet paddle madly underneath.

The opener, You Only Live Once, consciously tries to evoke the Cars, America’s own New Wave stars. The jaunty Razorblade resembles Barry Manilow’s Mandy, probably less consciously, and Electricityscape sounds like another single in waiting. Perhaps most surprising is the frantic Vision of Division, a track that sits between Greek plate-smashing music and the Velvets (not that big a gap, if you think about it). First impressions? Good — the Strokes could still outlast the very scene that they inspired.

STEVE JELBERT