Arctic Monkeys Explosion.

[mms]

its funny as people talk about this explosion etc as the democratisation of music along with my space etc, as if this is a good thing, whilst people like simon cowell tried to generate the same averages with pop musics lowest expectations and that was seen as a bad thing, which this real music has replaced.
It's good for label bosses and lazy journalists who can convert this democracy into currency and drooling hyperbole/free lunches. like macdonalds is the democratisation of food.

 

[minikomi]

heard a song on the telly and didnt think much of it.. the drummer has a better voice than the singer. .

2006 will be a rough year i think.

 

[k-punk]

you can look at this both ways surely, i don't subscribe to the notion that some periods are better for music than others. Once the dust has settled you'll find gems from any year/period you care to mention.

But you're equivocating between two claims here, one of which is plainly true (there are good records every year) and the other of which is plainly false to the point of being absurd (there are the SAME AMOUNT of good records every year). I'd go further: 'good records' aren't, in fact, the issue with pop; if it were, it would only be a question of aesthetics and consumption. Pop is also, crucially, about culture and events, both of which are conspicuously lacking at the moment.

 

[k-punk]

There certainly seems something mechanical and inevitable about the Rock process for sure. Lets not forget, its a music industry, a (supposed) creative industry. The NME, Q, and the others, TV and Radio, the style industry they all NEED this over-excitement for good trading. Its like a new line of Baked Beans has just come off the production line. Newly designed label, same taste- Get it Now!

Yes, but it was just as much of an industry and indeed a more succesful one when it wasn't engaging in hyping lame retro-shit.

 

[martin]

They make the 4-Skins seem avant garde and deeply profound

Words / phrases like 'awesome debut', 'stunning', 'unprecedented critical acclaim' etc are so redundant now, they've been tossed onto every advert for every new album over the past 5 years - even for unadulterated shit like KT Tunstall and that fucking imbecile picking leaves out of the tree (Jack Johnson?).
The weird thing is, I never ever come across anyone who actually listens to any of these incredible singer songwriter sensations.

 

[Diggedy Derek]

I heard a track of this the other day, and I thought it was something radio 1 DJ/wanker Chris Moyles had knocked up for some sort of in-joke. It's having-a-laff-music without a trace of humour.

 

[joeschmo]

Can't help but wonder why you're all so outraged. I can only imagine the Monkeys must be omnipresent in Britain right now or something. But why not just change the channel? Perhaps if we were living in a world with just a few cultural options, their success might matter, might mean something else was stifled. But it doesn't; we all have access to far more music than we can handle in a lifetime. So NME did a stupid list? Who cares? Rolling Stone does stupid lists all the time, and no one takes those seriously.

I also think there's nothing more retro than this desire for something "new." Modernism is dead, y'know. So is the avant-garde. They were 20th century phenomena, and they ate themselves. Grime is a little remix of a few pre-existing styles. So are the Monkeys. And compared to Oasis, they're a beacon of wit, energy, and intelligence. It could be worse.

 

[mms]

it struck me what they sound like
george formby - lyrics especially and delivery .
when this happened i thought wait a minute you could probably kill the artic monkeys dead with a george formby revival

 

[dominic]

what do people think about PINK GREASE and the LONG BLONDES? -- two rather trad bands from sheffield that i kinda like at the moment

 

[don_quixote]

i adore the long blondes for great pop songs and their singer has something about her. also fairy lights around the stage as they perform just look really cool. simple things usually work.

 

[gumdrops]

just read a really good piece on them in the stool pigeon newspaper. i actually really like them and have been meaning to post about them for months. i first thought they were a lumpen, sub-libertines knock off, but they are actually a really fantastic band. they have a lot of really novel, surprising touches in their music, and various riffs/melodies that make them a huge cut above the rest of the other 'big' indie bands with mainstream appeal. theyre also really fantastic songwriters/lyricists (and they dont just rewrite the same song/riff over and over like franz ferdinand). the new EP in particular is quite brilliant - i actually prefer the production to the album. less compressed, less mid level frequency-heavy, and a bit richer. the last track in particular is seriously good - reminds me of the smiths on hatful of hollow meets the libertines. if the libertines do get back together, they should get the monkeys' producer - this is what i hoped their albums would sound like, but regrettably they had to get mick 'i just press record' jones to produce them instead.

 

[gumdrops]

anyone else heard the new album yet? i like it. took some time to grow on me. not as good as the 1st one (obv?) but still really great. wish they hadnt got rid of the old bassist though. they seem to have lost something without him being there.

 

[Tactics]

I ain't heard the album but

I take my new era off to these man as...there actually very good and consistent

listened to them on Radio 1 yesterday and live there actually very...tight meaning they practice. that's quite refreshing considering a lot of groups now like the sloppy approach... which is also good

even lyrically...the dude has an actual gift...one of their new tunes, balaclava, even has a few parts that reminds me of a grime tune

the only thing that doesn't add up is...teenagers? I refuse to believe there this decent and teenagers...other bands yes but...

nah

low the hate...just accept that there good and move on I say

 

[Noah Baby Food]

Fuckin' right on mate, they ARE good. Only decent mainstream guitar pop band in the UK. Proper resonant, intelligent, good music. Did you read the interview with them in the Guide on Saturday? I liked them even more after that. They've got the right attitude.

 

[gumdrops]

yep, tactics is right - they are fucking TIGHT. their rhythm section is really quite amazingly muscular yet also very agile. and they can actually really *play* without being wanky about it. i genuinely adore the AMs. and alex turner is a supreme lyricist. i can see the 'were so normal' thing possibly seeming like a bit of a shtick down the line but right now i like what theyre saying. the guide comment about many arrangements at the moment being boring was spot on. i mean, i like bloc party toying a bit with dubstep on the prayer but they just totally ruin it by chucking in those predictable big snow patrol-y choruses at every opportunity. (well that and keles truly embarassing lyrics).

 

[swears]

I used to get riled up about dross like the AM's, but I really am apathetic about any sort of "progress" or innovation in popular music now. Fuck it, it's really not that important in the grand scheme of things, we've got looming enviromental and economic disasters, huge international conflicts started as social experiments, a completely fucked over underclass, things are looking very bleak. If the kids want to go nuts to a band that sounds like an amped-up version of Shed Seven, leave them to it. I listen to a lot of retro electronic stuff anyway, so who am I to talk?

 

[DRMHCP]

Total fakes singing about stuff they know nothing about to backing tracks that sound like b-sides from 1978-79.

If this band were from London the piss would be ripped so completely that theyd be a standing joke. ie imagine a band from somewhere like Barnet who's parents are all teachers etc coming on like Alf Garnett...everyone would piss themselves.
And please lets not have anyone from the outside South Yorkshire sticking up for them and saying "that's how they speak in Sheffield". Yes maybe if you're over 80 or something...I come from (and still live in) Sheffield and unlike the Arctic Monkeys actually come from a working class background and I don't. So how come the "Monkeys" the progeny of university educated teachers do.

At least it seems by the by no means universally praiseworthy reviews of the new album I've read they're hopefully already on the way down...

...but like swears says above theres more inportant things to worry about than pop music although when this crap forces itself onto national news programmes as though its actually relevant its sometimes hard not to get riled by it..

 

[don_quixote]

is anything else happening in sheffield drmhcp?

i've heard rolo tomassi who are some 16 year old grindcore-cum-heavy-metal deal. they are really ace.

 

[Logan Sama]

They are technically profficient and make good music.

But they are essentially a band of 4 lily allens. With matching ignorant opinions on music outside of their own immediate oeuvre

 

[Sick Boy]

I also have no problem with the Arctic Monkeys.

My whole family adores them, and I don't really listen to them much, but they entertain a lot of people, and they sound a lot different than all those other British Rock bands that rip off the Jam.

It's funny to me because my Father is 44 years old and grew up idolizing the Jam from their very beginnings. He owns everything they've ever released. But he likes the Monkeys BECAUSE they remind him of the Jam.

Similarly, his brother grew up as a punk. He went and bought the HIVES CD because it reminded him of what was going on back then. Sonically, of course. His politics have been obviously adjusted between the ages of 16 and 40-something.

It seems strange when someone of this generation uses the fact that bands are derivative as the bulk of their criticism, but then idolizes acts that were popular 30 years before their own birth.

I think that we should criticize bands for being derivative in some instances, but only because I believe that it is important for us to think that our generation is the BEST THAT HAS EVER EXISTED (a notion that K-punk was lambasting earlier). Not because we think the Beatles are not as good as anything coming out right now, but because we want our own Beatles.