Interpol Best Songs Ranked — The Definitive Guide

Obstacle 1 is Interpol's most perfectly constructed song and still the definitive introduction to the band. Kessler's opening guitar line announces itself as something fully formed — the interlocking, arpeggiated pattern that follows is one of post-punk revival's most recognisable riffs. Dengler's bass is a third guitar line happening simultaneously. Banks delivers one of his most compelling vocals over the top of it. Nothing in the catalogue surpasses the way all four elements lock together here.

Slow Hands is Interpol's biggest single and the most immediately accessible song in the catalogue — a driving, propulsive track built on one of Kessler's most straightforwardly hooky riffs. The song moves with a momentum that the more atmospheric debut material doesn't always aim for, and Banks' vocal is more direct here than almost anywhere else. It remains their most recognisable track to casual listeners and the correct entry point for anyone who wants something immediate.

Evil is the most immediately compelling track on Antics — an unusual song in the Interpol catalogue because its tension comes from understatement rather than atmosphere. The verse guitar is almost minimal, the bass more prominent than usual, and the chorus doesn't arrive with the release you might expect. Banks' delivery on the title word has been dissected at length. The song has aged into one of their most distinctive.

Leif Erikson is the most atmospheric track on Turn on the Bright Lights and arguably the most purely beautiful song in the Interpol catalogue. It closes the debut at a lower temperature than much of what precedes it — slower, more spacious, with Dengler's bass carrying a melodic weight that is almost orchestral. Banks' vocal sounds genuinely raw here in a way the band rarely allowed elsewhere. A song that improves with repeated listening in a way few of the singles do.

All the Rage Back Home is the best post-Dengler Interpol track and the song that proved the trio configuration could produce something worthy of the early catalogue. The opening riff is among Kessler's most propulsive, the rhythm section sounds energised rather than reduced, and Banks' vocal has a directness that had been missing from the two albums preceding it. The song effectively announced that El Pintor was going to be a genuine return to form.

Untitled opens Turn on the Bright Lights and serves as the most effective album opener in the Interpol catalogue — a track that establishes tone, palette, and intent within its first thirty seconds. The guitar line that opens it is spare and patient. Fogarino's drums arrive with authority. By the time Banks delivers his first line, the listener already understands exactly what kind of record this is going to be. A masterclass in opening a debut album.

The Heinrich Maneuver is the most danceable song in the Interpol catalogue and the strongest single from their major-label debut — a track that takes the post-punk structural template and pushes it closer to something you could actually move to. The production is bigger than anything on the first two albums, which suits this particular song better than it suits most of the surrounding material. One of their most underrated singles.

Hands Away is the most underrated song on the debut and one of the best deep cuts in the Interpol catalogue — a mid-tempo track that demonstrates the band's range within a single album. It moves differently from the surrounding material, slightly warmer in texture, with a chorus that opens up in a way the more austere tracks don't allow. Regularly overlooked by lists that focus on the singles, and consistently the track that rewards listeners who go deeper into the record.

Narc is the most rhythmically propulsive track on Antics and a song that demonstrates how well Fogarino and Dengler function as a rhythm section when the material gives them room to drive. The guitar is more restrained than on many of the singles, which lets the rhythm section take more of the song's structural weight. It sits in the middle of the album and is frequently cited as the track that makes the record more than just a collection of singles.

Toni closes this ranking as the strongest track from Interpol's most recent album and a late-career proof of concept — evidence that a band twenty-five years into their existence can still write songs that belong alongside their best early work. Produced by Flood, it is more restrained and atmospheric than the Marauder-era material, with a melodic precision in the guitars that recalls the debut without imitating it.