Sometimes inspiration strikes at the most unexpected times, as when hotly tipped New York retro-rockers the Postelles were on a recent Canadian tour opening for Vampire Weekend.

"We finished our album in a van on the way to Montreal," bassist John Speyer tells Spinner, nursing a hangover in a Reykjavik cafe the day after playing the Iceland Airwaves festival.

"Actually, we finished recording in New York," interjects frontman Daniel Balk.

"OK, we technically finished the album in the van," Speyer corrects himself. "We finally finished the tracklisting, which was a point of contention for a while. Actually, they finished it, I was sleeping."

"Recording was a multifaceted process," Balk recalls. "First we rented space at a studio called Quad Studios in Times Square, which was really weird because, as New Yorkers, we don't really spend a lot of time there."

"It's also the place Tupac got shot," adds Speyer with a smirk.

"So we were there for four days at first just, as an initial push and we basically worked 15, 16-hour days and we just went nuts," Balk continues. "That was half the record. The other half we did at Phillip Glass' Looking Glass Studio with our friend Albert Hammond, Jr. of the Strokes. Very different experiences."

Getting Hammond, Jr. to partially produce their upcoming eponymous album was a perfect fit. As well as sharing a hometown, the Postelles also share the Strokes' proficiency in putting a modern spin on familiar melodies. Songs like 'Boy's Best Friend' and 'Stella' take the songwriting skeleton of Phil Spector's girl group hits and filter them through the garage-rock sound emanating from New York since 2001.

"Albert's someone that we've been friends with for a while and we've always been big fans of his work," Balk fondly concedes. "It was an honour to work with him."