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Arctic Monkeys

  • Thread starter Thread starter Jaymin
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It really has grown on me the past week. I really think it's a brilliant album now. It's hard to think of it as an AM album, but on its merit, I think it's really interesting and enjoyable.
 

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Are these guys now objectively bad or is it just me?

Looks like they're following on from the last LP, making some pretty middle of the road lounge rock with the majority of the band are now basically redundant.

I know Arctic Monkey's purists eat up everything they put out, I just can't reconcile this being the same band that put out some of the most exciting rock music the past couple of decades.

Plenty of bands evolve their sound and work into different styles the keep things fresh - I just can't see the Arctic Monkeys properly capitalising and just keep running with different flavours of 'meh'.

What happened to those fast basslines and chaotic drum patterns? Also feel Alex Turner gets too much credit as a songwriter these days and dropping some intelligent-sounding word like 'subterfuge' papers over what are typically a pretty bland set of lyrics.

I'll listen to the new album when it comes out - I'm still always cautiously hopefully something will hit, but it's been a long time since they're put out anything half inspiring.
 
Anytime a band needs additional musicians for their live set up, and those musicians have bigger roles than the actual members, it's cause for concern. And it's reached a point where despite hoping that Turner is just taking the piss a bit with his get up and stage performance, I really don't think he is.
 
james Dean said:
Neither song has impressed me, and I loved TBH&C.

The great thing about this band is their ability to reinvent themselves. They don’t seem to have done it for this album
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It’s commendable to advance and try different things, but the issue for me is in attempting to create new sounds and moods they’re effectively genre hopping and there’s no improvement in the overall quality of their music.

Feel there has been a noticeable decline since Humbug.
 
Loonerty said:
Actually embarrassingly you're both objectively wrong.
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Chill.

Do you dispute that since their debut there has been:

  • a decline in their lyrics
  • a decline in their songwriting
  • a decline in the technicality of their music

Not all progression is good progression. The Arctic Monkey’s aren’t reinventing the wheel, they’re copy/pasting from existing formulas and genres that are well established.

The lyricism is becoming increasingly vague and tawdry.

I’m not sure what the appeal is anymore.
 
La Dispute said:
It’s commendable to advance and try different things, but the issue for me is in attempting to create new sounds and moods they’re effectively genre hopping and there’s no improvement in the overall quality of their music.

Feel there has been a noticeable decline since Humbug.
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Decline is subjective. Personally I loved each album including Humbug with SIAS being the weakest.

My issue is each album has been so different from the previous (which I support) but so far these songs seems like TBHC part 2.
 
james Dean said:
Neither song has impressed me, and I loved TBH&C.

The great thing about this band is their ability to reinvent themselves. They don’t seem to have done it for this album
Click to expand...
I don’t think both singles have been that bad compared to modern music and lack of variety (in particular Mirrorball), but it’s just been more just very meh so far compared to their standards.

Although in saying that, this might become the weakest Arctic Monkeys album in personal opinion, especially given the fact that every album before it was something different compared to now, as it is basically a continuous of TBHC (which I also loved as well mind you) but more cinematic and slower pace so far, as mentioned up to.

Lets just hope the next album cycle after this (if happens), will be a lot more fast paced just like their earlier albums were and Turner’s current side project (Last Shadow Puppets) as well.
 

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Still just not quite hitting the mark IMO.

If you enjoy their newer stuff the new LP is along similar lines, but there’s no real standout songs that push the album beyond being an easy listen without warranting many repeat listens.

Sounds like 80’s David Bowie in a lot of ways. There’s a lot of strings, fairly funky in parts. The LP would have worked as a soundtrack or an Alex Turner solo album - which is what TBHC basically felt like - and it’s really lacking any meaningful contributions from the rest of the band.

Lyrically it’s as disappointing as LP’s 4-6 have been. Alex keeps trying to sound poetic, but the the lyrics are so vague and overwrought. Using big words or superimposing sentences that don’t belong has become his schtick. I honestly think he’s run out of ideas.

When someone like Michael Stipe writes in complex sentence there’s still some underlying theme to what he’s trying to say - I don’t get that impression with newer Arctic Monkeys in the slightest, and I don’t think it’s worth any effort trying to properly unpack Alex Turner’s lyric sheets.

Reminds me of when The Mars Volta wrote Bedlam In Goliath by putting a few choice words into a sentence generator and that shaped a lot of the songs. Or when South Park clowned Family Guy and suggested the writers used Dugongs to randomly select lotto balls to produce jokes - there’s that same vibe.
 
Arctic Monkeys are my favourite band of all time but I couldn't get into TBHC and struggling with The Car as well. This style is just not for me.
 
I've been a long-time fan, starting with the first album and their first Melbourne gig at The Palace.

Naturally, my tastes have changed significantly along the journey, but I'm loving The Car and have listened to it a stack of times since its release.

It's very similar to TBH&C stylistically, but it's more consistent. It's an easier listen.

I get the view that it could be / should be an Alex Turner solo project, I read a little snippet on Apple Music about the Album where AT acknowledged that all of his work was influenced by the work that had come before it. (ie; His solo work and Last Shadow Puppets Work definitely influence AMs work)

I suspect it'll be my most-played AM album from this point forward. I'd anticipate that from here, for me, it would go:

The Car
------
Everything you've come to expect (The Last Shadow Puppets)
------
Humbug
Whatever People Say I am...
-------
The Age of the Understatement
-------
Favourite Worst Nightmare
Suck it and see (the back half of the album, I really like it from track 8)
AM
TBH&C

It isn't ground breaking or exciting, but it's high quality and it meets my tastes.
 

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