Arctic Monkeys Biography
British alternative rock is in the rudest health it has been for years, and a lot of that has been credited to the Arctic Monkeys. Their story is well-known now - after Alex Turner, the son of two teachers from High Green, just outside Sheffield, picked up a guitar and formed the band in 2002 with schoolfriends Jamie Cook on guitar, Matt Helders on drums and Andy Nicholson on bass.
A clutch of early gigs saw unprecedented levels of devotion swelling in Sheffield following their first show in 2003, which quickly spread beyond. Their limited-edition debut EP 'Five Minutes With Arctic Monkeys' quickly became a collector's item thanks to infectious lead track 'Fake Tales Of San Francisco'.
But the young Monkeys were not too worried about record sales, recording demos and passing them out to friends and fans at gigs, who promptly swapped them through the internet. The buzz grew organically, and by the time the band signed with Domino Records in June 2005 their signature tunes 'I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor', 'When The Sun Goes Down', 'Mardy Bum' and 'A Certain Romance' were firm folk favourites. Audiences were stunned by the strength of their songs, tickled by Turner's skewed social realist lyrics, and seduced by the intensity of their live performances.
When it finally arrived in January 2006 their debut album 'Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not' was an instant classic, spawning two number one singles, becoming the fastest selling debut in UK chart history and easily topping end of year polls in publications as varied as NME, The Guardian and The Sun. In February 2007 it earned them a further two Brit Awards.
After making 'Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not' with acclaimed rock producer Jim Abbiss (Kasabian, DJ Shadow, Placebo), the band took a creative swerve on its follow-up by working with James Ford, (whose 'We Are Your Friends', as Simian, became a UK club smash in tandem with the Monkeys) and Mike Crossey. "I think it was very obvious from when we did that first session that it was sound with them," affirms Alex, they understood it." "And," adds Jamie, "they're not much older than us really."
After locking themselves away from the world first time round, the band chose to record the follow-up in London. The experience saw them embrace full flow of the city, going out, living life and even having a bit of a party. "I think you can really hear it in the snare sound!" jokes Matt, but he's closer to the truth than he thinks.
The other big change within the ranks of Arctic Monkeys was the introduction of old friend Nick O'Malley on bass halfway through last year (replacing Andy Nicholson). This, too, was taken in everybody's stride. "I'd known them all since I was 10 years old," says Nick of his new bandmates. "We've all lived in the same area, so it wasn't like coming into a band where I didn't know what they'd be like. It's just been a laugh really, it's been fine."
'Favourite Worst Nightmare' is the thrilling second act to the Arctic Monkeys' story, a breakneck technicolour journey through of screwball punk and guitar-fuelled dancefloor heroics, it's very, very fast and very, very loud; a brilliant racket that proves there's infinitely more to Arctic Monkeys than mere pop songs; though it has them in spades.
Musically at least, it follows on from the last songs they wrote from 'Whatever...'; 'View From The Afternoon', 'From The Ritz To The Rubble' and 'Vampires'. A fast and throbbing record was always part of the plan. They did have slow songs, but as Alex points out, "they were never as much fun in the rehearsal room or whatever so why do them? I'd rather make an album like that that's exciting. I don't really want to make it sound like we've 'grown up'."
And Alex Turner - the 21-year-old credited with ushering a new generation of young British beat poetry, is on tantalising form. While their number one hit 'When The Sun Goes Down' told the tale of an undesirable 'Scummy Man' from their hometown of Sheffield, lead single 'Brianstorm' details a quite different kind of deviant character.
Alex remembers: "What happened were we met this guy called Brian, and when he left the room we were a bit freaked out by his presence, so we did like a brainstorm for what he was like, drew a little picture and wrote things about him."
"He was right weird," shudders guitarist Jamie Cook. "He just appeared with, like, a business card..." "...and like a round neck Tshirt and a tie loosely round it, I'd never seen that before. It felt like he were trying to get inside your mind. We were checking out his attire, freaked out. He definitely left a mark on us. He might have been a magician. He might even be here now. But if we ever found out who he was, it might spoil it."
'D Is For Dangerous' - the source of the line 'Favourite Worst Nightmare' itself - is a typically colourful tale of 'dirty little herberts' and their sexual politics where insecurity is no barrier to promiscuity, of "desperately trying to recreate what was only three quarters of an hour ago." The prickly 'Balaclava', meanwhile finds that the innocent punch-ups of debut album track 'Riot Van' have given way to something more sinister.
Elsewhere, Alex lets the listener deeper into his own soul. The album's pop centrepiece 'Flourescent Adolescent' talks sharply of fishnets and boy-slags and 'little books of sextips' and remembering 'when you used to be a rascal'. It's the story of "somebody that once you thought was amazing, and turns out not to be." And what started as "a pisstake song we were just having a laugh with," has turned into a bigger tune than you could ever imagine." A disco-inflected cousin of live favourite 'Mardy Bum', its an early favourite for anthem of 2007's British festival season. A season that will see them make their debut at the legendary Glastonbury Festival as headliners.
Also still intact is Alex's knack of spinning magic out of the mundanity. Emotional centre 'The Only Ones Who Know' sounds like the tenderest song of longing; but, insists Alex it dates back to an innocuous story of two newcomers to the city. "There was this girl and this lad, who had obviously been lumped together, and they just asked us, it was like Sunday night, 'where's good to go to tonight?' I wrote that about them."
But such a simple request for directions stirred a romantic spirit in Alex, who, hoping they would be 'holding hands by New Year's Eve' made it 'harder to believe that true romance can't be achieved these days'." Maybe they've got married by now.
Further broadening the album's palette of tone and texture is the plaintive final track '505'. Perhaps their most daring work yet, it weaves golden swathes of spidery guitar around a plaintive Alex, winding his way through hotel corridors, crooning in anticipation of the adventures ahead. But more of those on the next album.
But if 'Favourite Worst Nightmare' belongs to anybody it's the band themselves - all four of them this time - not just the funny one who writes songs about girls on dancefloors. From 'This House Is A Circus' supercharged waltz, the blink-and-you'll-miss-it Duran Duran reference in tribute to 'Dancefloor' to the dense prog (yes, prog) of the stultifying 'If You Were There, Beware', it's the sound of four men gorging themselves on musical possibility. "Thinking of the music we've heard since we made the first record," says Alex, "we'd heard fuck all really."
Next up, recreating such fast and furious songs live is going to test every fibre of their being (Matt has even taken up boxing to have any hope of surviving the tours), but with barely a moment to catch their breath, the Arctic Monkeys are ready for action. For the second year running, this one looks like it belongs to them.
