ARCTIC MONKEYS INTERVIEW

• 23rd Oct 2005

Glasswerk's Johnny Nicholson caught up with the hottest band of the year 'The Arctic Monkeys' after the Glasgow gig of their current tour:

How’s the tour going?
Alex: Yeah, right sound. Five or six gigs now.
Guitar tuner: Nah, more like eight.
Alex: We ain’t drawn or lost any so far, so it’s been good.

How did you feel after the London gig, 2000 people hurling lyrics back at you with only one official release?
Alex: Well, it’s pretty similar to what we’ve had in Norwich or wherever. It’s just been like that back in February, it just gets built up like that ‘cause it’s in London and it’s the biggest one. Looking forward to this one a lot more to be honest, the ABC looks a right venue. It’s Friday night and that, and everyone’s up for it, so are we.

Does it put you under pressure playing the bigger venues?
Alex: I dunno, we’ve been here three times before now, we’re just playing to a few more people I suppose. There’s always a bit a pressure though, it would be rubbish without it sort of thing.

Any bands you like playing with?
Alex: We like playing with? Milburn. The Little Flames. We met Milburn a couple of times and The Little Flames we met and quite liked their music, so it’s cool.

How did the recording of the album go?
Alex: Good.
James: It all went pretty smoothly.
Alex: We started mixing it yesterday. So…
James: We’re gonna do more mixing in London, week after next.

Are there new tracks on the album or is it just the MP3’s?
James: Well, we’ve recorded some new songs, but it’s about half and half, songs you’ll of heard, and new songs as well.

What will be the single after “I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor”, will that be A Certain Romance, Mardy Bum or a new tune?
James: It’s not going to be a new song. It’s Sun Goes Down (Scummy). And then we haven’t really planned the next one after that, but that’s like promoting the album kinda thing.

What influenced you on the album, and what sound is it going to be?
James: We want it to catch like, the live aspect of us. But we don’t want it to be messy, but we want it to be powerful, like Defiantly Maybe, that kinda sound.

Did you do anything to mark the anniversary of John Peel’s death?
James: No… Did we play a gig?
Alex: We had a night off, we went around Glasgow. We ended just up here…
James: Art School.
Alex: It were alright, yeah…
Guitar Tuner: Franz Ferdinand weren’t there.

What do you think of music in the last year as well?
Alex: We’ve come out.
James: Yeah… haha…
Alex: That’s alright….
James: There’s been a lot of like, hyped up bands, that are really poor. I just hope when people when they look at us… we always try and live up to our hype.

Do you reckon that the music press over hypes bands?
James: Yeah, I reckon so. There’s a lot of bands that get over-hyped. As well as the bands that don’t get the exposure they deserve. You gotta feel sorry for them.

What do you reckon about copyright laws, given you got a lot of your fame from mp3’s and bootleg demo’s?
James: I don’t think you can scrap them. You’ve got to make a living, really, I dunno, I reckon it’s better if you own a record. It’s not so much the real music fans will go out and buy a record, it’s people who listen to pop music that download most of the time.

Does it feel at all strange to be compared to Oasis as well as The Libs?
Alex: Yes, it’s kinda strange, but you gotta keep on with what you’re doing, I mean if there’s someone we’re being compared to, there’s worse we can be compared to. I find the Libertines and Babyshambles, a bit pretentious; it’s a bit dreamy really.
James: They want to write poetry with clever hidden meanings, we prefer lyrics that are easier to get.

Did you prefer gigs or did you prefer recording, or do you like both?
James: I like both really.
Alex: I find more a gig more intense, but with recording we’ve got a lot of new stuff now, so I’m looking forward to like doing them and going on the mic and doing some more stuff. But when we were recording demos and stuff, we didn’t really know 100% what we were doing. But by the time of the album we knew everything inside out, so the recording side is some progress. We want to go back and record, I think its good being in a studio. The feeling you get when you come out, when you’ve got something new. But then gigs are more alive ‘cause we can see what’s going on.
James: You can’t really beat an open mike.

JOHNNY NICHOLSON