It’s an inevitable comparison, but wasn’t it John Lennon who made that comment about “the eye of the hurricane” being the safest place during the height of Beatlemania? I’m open to correction, but I also seem to remember that it was 1966 before he made that comment and by then The Beatles had endured four years of the manic treadmill.
Fast forward 40 years and four more Northern lads find themselves in a similar situation, though by the standards of their Fab forbears their rise has been truly meteoric. Let’s face it, fifteen months back, few outside their immediate circle really knew who THE ARCTIC MONKEYS were and now even small mini-marts in obscure market towns in this writer’s adopted home of West Cork are carrying glossies with Alex Turner’s handsome, but anxious-looking phisog staring out from them.
Time to try and put the brakes on then? No chance of that, not now the car’s rolling like a runaway juggernaut, so what does Alex Turner think as he’s staring into the eye of said media hurricane? Wine, roses, girls and celebration? Not according to the apparently cheekily-titled “Who The Fuck Are Arctic Monkeys?” EP. You’re probably thinking it’s just a typically tongue-in-cheek way of getting the F-word to number one, but if I hear correctly, it’s much more likely to be a note of concern and a comment on this whole ‘celebrity’ malarkey from these four lads who are shaking the world and finding the earth shaking precariously about their feet.
Not that this new five-tracker is a joyless affair by any means, just slightly older and wiser, and lyrical concerns aside it’s a great reminder of the kind of value for money EPS that all the important British groups along the way (think The Jam, The Smiths, Oasis etc) have wooed us with. Main track “The View From The Afternoon” is the only track re-visiting the album and while it’s not in all honesty an obvious single choice (surely “Mardy Bum” should have been the one?) it’s still a beautifully-observed snapshot of a night out (“They’re all looking quite forlorn in bunny ears and devil horns”) with Matt Helders again proving what a powerhouse he is and the intro and outro coming full circle magnificently.
Entering on a crescendo and excitable and jittery in roughly equal measures, “Cigarette Smoker Fiona” is another gnarly and gritty commentary on a hi-jinks fuelled night out with further terrific lyrical invective from Alex Turner (“as the evening moves on, dignity fucks off”) and the lads’ tough-as-nails indie guitars allied to some manic, Math-rock changes. It’s good, but arguably even better is the George-Formby-goes-indie of the perky’n’blue “No Buses” where the band show off their natural melancholia and Alex muses “lady, where’s your love gone? You used to be the antiseptic to the sore.” Magic.
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For me, though, the two tunes that hit home the hardest are “Despair In The Departure Lounge” and the title track, both of which find Alex commenting on the frayed edges that will inevitably appear as Monkey mania grows ever bigger. The self-explanatory former is a downbeat guitars and voice affair which opens with Turner noting “he’s pining for air in a people carrier” before launching into a classic on-tour-pissed-off-and-missing-her scenario (“there might be tellies in the backs of the seats in front/ but Del and Rodney just won’t do”) which is anything but the spoilt brat moaning about his pin-up status.
The title track, meanwhile, may bring up the rear, but it’s one of the best things they’ve done to date. Initially it sounds like it could easily have made the album because it features the band playing out of their skins and nailing down a great groove, but lyrically Alex is considerably bleaker as he muses the transience of their media-darling status (“in five years time it will it be ‘who the fuck’s Arctic Monkeys’”?), vows to “stick to their guns” and concludes with a dark, mantra-like section culminating in “bring on the backlash!” You could say he’s deluded and paranoid, but you could just as easily say he’s being realistic.
“Who The Fuck Are Arctic Monkeys?” then, is largely the work of an elated-but-bruised, rapidly getting experienced foursome who – despite everything – are still giving it their all and keeping their noses way in front. Time will tell of course, but if your reviewer had to bet on who just might get out of here alive, then his money’s still on The Arctic Monkeys.
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