Toni (Interpol song)

"Toni" is centered around a piano motif written by guitarist Daniel Kessler. Frontman Paul Banks said of the song:

“‘Toni’ is one of two songs that Daniel wrote with a piano as the core. It was actually one of the songs that we wrote remotely, then we got together for in-person sessions: 10-day, two-week stretches of just jamming all day. ‘Toni’ was a song that really took shape in one of those live sessions. We got Daniel mic’d up on a piano and had to make a decision: Are we going to make this a rock song? Is this going to have electric bass and electric guitar? Or is it just going to use sound effects? We decided we were going to use traditional instrumentation, and what it turned out to be is fun. It felt like a natural beginning to a record.“[2]

In their review for The Other Side of Make-Believe, Pitchfork described "Toni" as "the heretofore-inconceivable “Interpol California song,” swapping ambient synth washes for a plinking piano, slacking the eighth-note grid just the tiniest bit, allowing Banks’ voice to relax into a world-weary but satisfied tone."[3]

The music video follows frontman Paul Banks in a police car observing a couple fleeing from a gang with weapons, confronting the couple through choreographed dances. Director Van Alpert decided to create it as a "hyper-modern, cinematic dance film", an idea he felt was new for Interpol.[4]

Tom Taylor of Far Out Magazine gave the song an 8, writing ""Toni" is moonlit and mildly menacing but it builds towards an adrenalised fracas free from any musical malaise. It’s Halloween heist music, and being the only occupants of that unique pigeonhole gets a big thumbs up in itself."[5]