Artic Monkeys

slipss

There has probably been something posted about Artic Monkeys before but I didn't see it so I was just wondering what everybody thought about them.
I didn't like them to begin with because I thought they were just over-hyped but then I realised every Northern Englang indie band is going to be compared to Oasis or the Stone Roses, which immediatly sets them up to fail, because ye can't compare someone to two of the greatest bands of the ninetis and expect them to live up to it. I didn't really like any of thier songs at first when I bought thier album (I was a victim of good publicity agents) but a few of thier songs have really ****ing grown on me. Anyways whats your opinion?

Basq

Think they're a bit of a fad to be honest.. but that's just me!

Their album is quite forgettable in my opinion. Just another Franz Ferdinand and Kaiser Chiefs - bands which are due to drop off into obscurity any day now.

Another year, another Brit-band that gets raved about by the press and then slowly disappear off the radar. This year, it's Hard-Fi. Last year, Kaiser Chiefs. Year before that, The Darkness etc.

Just a matter of time!

arbeitsscheuer

Lovely optimistic viewpoint there from Basquille!

Well, I love em tbh. Have the album, a live collection as well called Beneath the Boarwalk, a few other demos n stuff.

Just really great, catchy tunes with lyrics that I find humorous and actually quite observant in places as well. Also, lovin the Yorkshire accent - first time I've ever heard a band from that area use their natural accents in singing, and it sounds wicked!

As a context: I hate Franz Ferdinand and Kaiser Chiefs. I love Hard-Fi, Bloc Party, Snow Patrol.

I don't really like or dislike bands because of their genre or image. I just give anythin a listen and if I like it I like it, and if I don't I chuck it on the pile with the other sh*te.

Basq

SebTheBum wrote:

Lovely optimistic viewpoint there from Basquille!

I've not always been like this... but i've just seen this story so many times before!

I've seen this hype over the "best new British band" numerous times before and always has a very similar outcome in that the band either fades away after one album, another band with a similar style comes along and replaces them or they've a disappointing follow-up album and quickly people lose interest.

Of course.. i hope i'm wrong about Artic Monkeys mainly because i want someone to break outta this pattern i see forming year after year.

arbeitsscheuer

basquille wrote:

I've not always been like this... but i've just seen this story so many times before!

I've seen this hype over the "best new British band" numerous times before and always has a very similar outcome in that the band either fades away after one album, another band with a similar style comes along and replaces them or they've a disappointing follow-up album and quickly people lose interest.

Of course.. i hope i'm wrong about Artic Monkeys mainly because i want someone to break outta this pattern i see forming year after year.

Why does a good band have to be so hyped tho? Or have such expectation?

I mean, seriously, what's up wit that? As you so rightly say, it's just a recipe for disaster, and, if I may continue the metaphor, is one which has cooked up the same results year after year for as long as I can remember.

But I gave up taking account of cr*p like that years ago.

All I knew about Arctic Monkeys before I got the album was 1 (ONE) interview on RTE Radio with the band, where I thought they sounded pretty down to earth, and 1 (ONE) song played, Bigger Boys & Stolen Sweethearts. That piqued my interest, and upon grabbing the album, I wasn't disappointed.

Hard-Fi I knew nothing about (literally nothing) until my sis gave me her CD and told me to give em a listen because they were, in her words, "Sh*t hot".

Besides, I'm into loadsa bands that the media doesn't take the blindest bit of notice of. Why should I react differently to a band just because the media hyped them?

Jimi-Spandex

SebtheBum wrote:

Besides, I'm into loadsa bands that the media doesn't take the blindest bit of notice of. Why should I react differently to a band just because the media hyped them?

Why? Well for me when a band tends to get hyped and over exposed it leads to their music being played way too much. By and large by the time this has happened I've been listening to them for a good while and it's quite likely that I've played it to death already.

I don't want to hear it again let alone every hour on the radio or at every house party I go to or at the clubs/bars on the weekends. Which is bloody inevitable. And bloody annoying.


That said, I'm not in the country nor do I watch MTV or listen to the radio anymore so I'm not really affected by it with reference to Arctic Monkeys.

Amazotheamazing

Once upon a time, a young band had the fastest selling debut album since Oasis, entered the British charts at number 1, even had a top 10 hit in America, much like the Artic Monkey's, the world was theirs for the taking. The band were Kula Shaker.

Arucard

your poll left out the "over-rated crap" option. i dont get it at all, there is absolutely nothing special about the band. ignoring the fact that i dont like the music, they still are a very ordinary band.

Nalz

theyre okay, Id listen to them now and again...wouldnt have the album on repeat or anything but theyre okay. simple as, different strokes for different folks...but I dunno what the guy that hates music is posting in here. I hate marmite, gonna post in their forum now. laters!!

Jonny Arson

I know so many people are sceptical about Arctic Monkeys based completely on the attention they recieve (not ask for) which is very sad but I can assure they are the real f**king deal and please please no one ever dare put them in the same league as Kaiser Chiefs.

IMO every single bit of the hype is justified. NME go a bit too OTT at times (5th best British album may sound hyped but I'd rate it top 10 personally) which I can't argue but the music does all the talking for me. I've not listened to band in years who have hit songwriting on the head like this band. Arctic Monkeys haven't come out to produce inventive music, they make sheer anthems and I'm all for opinions and I will be a hyprocite here but with regards to their debut, anyone who says that album is average and overrated is just wrong, I'm sorry. Arctic Monkeys are ridiculously talented, yeah their music may be no brainer in your face rock n' roll anthems but I find there are alot of bands out there who are good but lack that consistent songwriting ability, Arctic Monkeys have everything with regards to making anthems.

I rate them up there with a young Oasis. The cockiness and youthful anthems are there just like Oasis of 1994. Another sign to me as to why they will be around for years is the songs of theirs that haven't made the album. They could release another album equally as good as their debut tomorrow if they could, no exaggeration.

Arctic Monekys are not ''a fad or a fashion'' which is funnily enough a lyric from their song Still Take You Home. A band doesn't go to No.1 on it's first release in it's first week (single and album) being simply a fashion or being cool. Yes album sales or no.1's don't make a good band or act (James Blunt proves this) but no one can say they are a trend or fad when the sold 350,000 copies of their debut album it's first week, trends and fads don't happen that quickly. They havent sucked the mainstream knob like Kaiser Chiefs have. Arctic Monkeys haven't asked or whored themselves this attention, their music has done this.

Opinions are opinions and if you're not into them (which obviously people will not be into them) please don't go on this hype, hype hysteria that I constantly read. People love Arctic Monkeys because of their music nothing else believe me.

anthony_086170

i think theres alot of muppets posting here to be honest look at the facts

distributed cd's at there gigs and there fan base was huge before the album was released because of sharing songs over the internet.

oasis were and are muck end off,people just liked them because of there hair and fighting each other and a dyslexic muppet writing songs,unybrowed mancs.

artic monkeys described my chris martin from coldplay as the best band in the world and thats his opinion not everybody's ok

paul weller loves them as they are getting to the top there own way

the have the biggest selling debut album of all time in uk by releasing 1 song ?????? that says it all

they wont appear on top of the pops and dc-uk lark as they didnt need them to get where they are,they hold the cards in there own hands and do what they want and thats the way it should be,they tell record company what they want to do and that shows power,liam and noel where 21 and 25 or something like that when oasis burst out but these lads are 19 and 20 and only playing instruments bout 4 or 5 years and were all mates at school.people who slag them off are jealous people in bands that cant go anywhere no vision and think they better.

i myself am in a band and play guitar.im playing guitar 15 years and i think there **** hot the lyrics are far more mature than the lads themselves.this is what music needs some band to come out and fook the boybands off the music scene an di bet there next album will be a bigger seller than oasis's whats the story

anthony_086170

350,000 in one week ok and considering u can download the whole album for free aswell what does that say about pulling power.u ask anybody about oxegen festival this year who they wanna see

80 % artic monkeys i met the lads in the ambassador and had a great chat to them and alex turner the singer at 19 im telling you gives nothing away verty smart young man

Nightwish

They sound like all the other guitar bands that the Brits keeping chucking out every year with the title "the next best thing".

bottlerocket

Zane, yer the voice of reason in many a music debate on boards, I tip my hat to you sir....

What I don't get about all this is why can't people just accept the album on its own terms, regardless of hype? If the tunes stand up, hype doesn't come into it for me. What they have done is to put out an excellent debut album. They're not reinventing the wheel music-wise, but Alex is an inspired lyricist, and remember they are still very young. What's reminiscent of Oasis is the attitude sure, but also the way people have taken them to their hearts. Honestly, when was the last time you saw a band have this impact with a debut? And top marks to them for doing it with style, class and integrity too. Good luck to em, they deserve all the success they've had.

adox

I like em.

Wertz

I said my peice on them and their album in the reviews forum.

To recap, 'm not into this genre at all with some exceptions...this band being one of them.
...and once they don't get spoiled by all the pressure and hype that the UK media chooses to throw at them, I think they will only get better....I just hope it's not a "difficult second album" scenario.

One thing I really like about them is I've heard recordings of their live stuff and it's more or less indiscernible from their studio stuff (on the album); that says to me that they have a lot of talent and I'd love to see them live (again, I'm a club music type and live gigs aren't my thing, but I'd make an exception).

The album went in at the highest position for an indy album, ever, in the Billboard chart this week, and none other than the Sugababes have chosen to do "Bet you look good..." as a B-sdie on their next single ( :rolleyes: )

Fair play to them...hating something just because of hype or popularity is a pretty sad thing to do, at least when it comes to music IMO. Don't be haters...

palantír

I don't like them.

slipss

anthony_086170 wrote:

oasis were and are muck end off,people just liked them because of there hair and fighting each other and a dyslexic muppet writing songs,unybrowed mancs.

well I couldn't really understand anything you wrote after that, like when someone says "hitler was misunderstood" or" Bob Dylan couldn't write songs" or "America isn't about capitalism" everything after that just kinda stops making sense.

slipss

anthony_086170 wrote:

oasis were and are muck end off,people just liked them because of there hair and fighting each other and a dyslexic muppet writing songs,unybrowed mancs.

No but seriously, I see your point, Oasis were muck, and Underworld couldn't tell one end of a mixer from the other, and Jimmy Hendrix couldn't string two cords together, and Mozart just smashed his fingers against random keys, and people that use the phrase "end of" aren't pathetic brainwashed Pop generation scousers...

ctrl-alt-delete

Zane from MTV2 wrote:

Another sign to me as to why they will be around for years is the songs of theirs that haven't made the album. They could release another album equally as good as their debut tomorrow if they could, no exaggeration.

Great point you make here, I had all the demos before the album was out and i was surprised at some of the songs that didn't make the album, there are some great tunes out there that are not on the album. It will be interesting however to see if these appear on the next album.

You also made another important point about sucking up to the media, I admit i actually liked the kaiser chiefs at the start, even before the album came out, but they way they are acting now is wrecking my head so much so that i cannot remember the last time i listened to the album. The arctic monkeys have continually refused to appear on a load of TV shows that they just dont want to appear on - I get the impression its just totally about the music for them and i hope this continues for them, Its quite obvious they don't have to sell out.

sprinkles

Personally I don't think they live up to the hype. They are a good band don't get me wrong but some of the labels they are rceiving are premature to say the very least. I had all their demo stuff before and I have the album now and it is good, and it's well worth a listen I think alot of people are jumping the gun a bit. Only time will tell if they have what it takes, but they certainly show promise and even if they go nowhere thay have left behind a good album to be remembered by.

As for people hating them because of the hype, I'd say a lot of people love them for the same reason.

Wertz

sprinkles wrote:

As for people hating them because of the hype, I'd say a lot of people love them for the same reason.

That's a fair point. In fact it's likely there's more of the latter than the former...

Basq

Monkeys

jonny68

Just downloaded their album fu*k that paying for music it's quite good actually but they are nothing that special,not as good as the kaiser chiefs

Wertz

Heard some of their new stuff from rumoured next album on Zhane Lowe's show last few nights. Still got a lot to give. The single will probably be another no.1...The View From The Afternoon, gonna be played at about 8.55 tonight (ie in 5 minutes), if you wanna listen online.

spacecoyote

yeah don't quite get the poll options, which one means the latest in a line of hype-bands?

I don't like them at all myself, haven't listened to the whole album, but found what i've heard so far not particularly original or inventive. they really are a case of smart marketing (on their own behalf). just put an idea in peoples heads, let word of mouth do its job and suddenly you've got the next big thing for all the sheep of the world to jump on the back of. there's so many people out there saying "i'm into original music like the arctic monkeys, i'm an individual, i don't listen to pop music". Who are they trying to fool?

weemcd

what a waster > when the sun goes down

ziggy

This post has been deleted.

popinfresh

Well, I like them in that they seem like the first really Naughties band. They're singing for this generation. And I do think they're pitch is an original one. They dont sing about 'I love you', "I hate you", 'I'm leaving' etc..

They're very fresh. And well, lets hope something better comes out. But I reckon lyrically they're better than Oasis, but that's just me

Jonny Arson

Their new EP out later this month ''Who The Fuck Are The Arctic Monkeys'' is a bit disapointing I'm afraid to say. The new title track is very good, the lead track ''The View From The Afternoon'' which is from the album is smashing but the other 3 new songs on it are poor by their high standards. One of their best unreleased songs ''Cigarette Smoke'' now called ''Cigarette Smoker Fiona'' and re-recorded with new lyrics on the EP has been butchered by themseleves. Just hope its a blip as they have at least another 8 exceptional unreleased songs which piss all over this EP.