Let's get something straight. First and foremost, 'The View from the Afternoon' is quite easily, one of the finest singles of the year. Brash, in-yer-face and an air drummer's dream. Despite the intro aping Supergrass' 'Richard IIIrd', it's forgiven by way of having the single best pop hook of the year. I'd defy anyone not to be roped in when Alex Turner sings, "and you won't be surprised," as if his whole life and career depends upon it. To be perfectly honest, after somewhere between 40-50 repeated listens, I can safely state that 'The View from the Afternoon' is a near-perfect nugget of musical glory and if the band had chosen to release it as a straight-up single, they'd have been forcing me to push a 9 or a 10 into the bottom of this review.
Things can never be that simple with the Arctic Monkeys though.
The four tracks that follow vary from the boring to the dire, scraping the barrel of their Northern pomp and committing 15 minutes to tape that most other bands would have binned as soon as they saw the reaction on the faces of their label.
'Cigarette Smoker Fiona' is a limp, lifeless second edition of the opening track, replete with lacklustre lyricism and a half-assed guitar widdle throughout proceedings. Worryingly though, it does get worse.
The introverted nature of 'Despair in the Departure Lounge' and 'No Buses' leaves me feeling cold and shut out, like someone (or of course, the nation as a collective hype machine) has ripped the soul out of this band and left them unable to hit home like they could all of... six months ago.
This isn't the 'start of the backlash', but it is cause for concern. The reluctantly-monikered 'band of the people' will have their crown stolen sooner than all could have imagined if their output remains this unimaginative. I'm choosing to ignore the closing title track, simply because this kind of self-referential post-modernism would make me disregard the entire output of the band if I took it seriously.
Just go and listen to 'The View from the Afternoon' on repeat.
...
Agreed on the No Buses and Cigarette Smoker Fiona comments, they're average filler but Despair.. gets me every time and Who The Fuck Are Arctic Monkeys is by and far the clverest thing for a hype-band to do for ages. It's a bit funky as well.
*cleverest
View From The Afternoon is pop nugget of the year, definitely.
clever?
Nah. It's not saying anything new or interesting. It's kinda embarassing in fact.
Embarassing?
Nah, I think it's really quite inventive, and a little bit insightful to how their minds are working in what is quite a unique situation. We should be thankful we get a chance to hear a different perspective at such an early stage. They've obviously taken a bit of a gamble on it, and I think they should get the benefit of the doubt. After all, it's not all paranoia, I like the bit about 'market suicide' and fending off all the grubby corporates.
Cigaratte Smoke
r Fiona is a terrible version of the awesome demo. No Buses is a nice song, as is Who the Fuck Are Arctic Monkeys. But Despair is what Riot Van should have been.
The track 'Who The Fuck...'
Itself is a terribly paranoid piece of music.
the should
release Choo Choo off the original E.P.
The first time a song title has
my name in, and it's rubbish.
Boo.
what about
'fiona'
as in
'fiona, whoa whoa.
fiona, whoa whoa.
she gave Giggsy the ball
and Arsenal won fuck all'
Jordan*
view from...
just sounds like a shit version of a Dive Dive song.
I like the production though.
Well, if this review is an example
of the honeymoon period, God help Alex and the boys when the inevitable backlash kicks in. Fuck me.
For the uninitiated, every track on this EP is a winner, especially Despair In The Departure Lounge and the self-referential title track which is about as post-modern as 'Clash City Rockers' or 'This Is Radio Clash' were, i.e. not at all. It's just fucking great.
Ignore the 4/10 rating. That's bullshit.
Comparing The Clash to
Arctic Monkeys is like comparing a diamond to a turd.
No. it's not.
And I didn't. Other than that your point was brilliant. Well done.
4/10 is brilliant too
and slightly too generous.
Thankyou for the
Brilliant review about utterly shit songs
Jambo knows the score
even if he does like Coldplay.
He also likes Muse.
Make of that what you will.
Muse?
What's wrong with muse?
The_Glory is right
How dare Colin write an objective and balanced review?
Sack him at once.
mynci's
I cant stand the arctic monkeys, but I heard one of the tracks off here, it was an acousticy thing which sounded a little john lennony/beatlesy and I didn't mind it. I couldn't give two fucks about anything else by them though. And another thing, the monkeys will never be 'inventive'. I mean all they are is an amalgamation of all the bands that the nme have wet themselves over for the last 5 years. Retro Adidas jacket? Check! Choppy punky guitars? Check! Alledged 'band of the people' claim? Check! But fucking hell kids, people on council estates couldn't give a flying monkeys about them! ahem!
what is your evidence for any of this
I'm so sick of you jumped-up people coming on here and making these sweeping statements with no fact.
It's all very well making an opinion, but when you claim that 'people on council estates couldn't give a flying monkeys about them', you've just spoken for about 2 million people at once. The law of averages implies that at least ONE of these people has bought/downloaded the record.
I doubt many people can stand you to be honest.
i live
on a northern council estate. and i bought the record. nuff said.
Music isn't objective. It's subjective.
And the Titanic with a ruddy great hole in it had more balance than that review.
It's a good review
but let's not forget, Colin's opinion is just as important and valid as yours. I don't know how you can say it's unbalanced when he praises one track to the high heavens but is of the opinion the rest is junk. That seems like a pretty fair conclusion, even if it's disparate to yours. If you disagree, you can say so here. That's what these wonderful commenty things allow us to do!
I happen to agree with Colin. I personally don't think they've written a good song since the stuff from their album.
No offence, but that review was shoddy.
His 'analysis' of the new tracks amounts to little more than half-arsed adjectives like 'dire' and 'boring'. He says the lyrics to Cigarette Smoker Fiona are lacklustre but doesn't even attempt to give examples or explain why. He says two of the songs are introspective without even attempting to explain what they might be about.
And the title track he smugly dismisses out-of-hand, seemingly because it's got the band's name in the lyrics. Apparently this makes it postmodern. If being self-referential makes a song postmodern then pretty much every hip hop and grime artist there's ever been is postmodern. I'm sure Lady Sovereign would agree, if she wasn't already tucked up in bed eating les cuisses de la grenouille from a silver salver whilst reading The Postmodern Condition by Jean-François Lyotard.
Lady Sovereign
is as postmodern as can be. And yes being self-referential does make you postmodern. Be Here Now is very Postmodern for example for ripping off previous Oasis songs that ripped off other people's songs.
..Eh?
I swear he went on 6Music and called them a band for people who had 'just grown out of Busted'.
I could be wrong, but someone did.
oh, look!
it's The_Glory! everyone's favourite day-release contributor!
hmmm
i was a huge fan of the original demos and the album, defending myself against torrents of abuse you get from 'scenesters' for liking this kind of stuff. Indeed all the b-sides i've heard to date have been on a par with the rest of their stuff (personally I think 7 is one of their catchiest songs).
But i listened to this today and to be honest it didn't grab me at all, which i was somewhat disappointed with. I'll give it another listen to see if maybe i just wasn't in the right mood though, but on first glance i'd have to say i agree more than i disagree with the review.
The_Glory
is my favourite DiS poster.
It literally only takes something like this "mate, Oasis are shit" to kick him off. He's that bloke in the pub who puts Definitely Maybe on the pub jukebox, and then struts around sipping his pint and mouthing all the words. In short, a genius.
What is your evidence for this - crablin
The evidence is that they bore me and countless others. The law of averages suggest that one or more people can't stand you, my friend
I listened to this earlier..
...with my new speakers but sadly due to illness only one ear. I quite liked it though, especially departure lounge and who the fuck? don't think much of the title track as a single, though...
Yeah...
Quite an accurate review. It really isn't worth buying. The album's a better investment than this EP. I'm not sure what they were thinking when they changed Cigarette Smoke to Cigarette Smoker Fiona. It's an ugly sight, to say the least.
Coat Tails
Try as they might, they'll still never write Don't Look Back Into The Sun or Time For Heros. Coat tails will always spring to mind for me.
So does nobody remember the Moonies doing the same thing
with Who the Fuck are The Moonies a few years back? No? Well, I don't blame you, they were a bit shite...
Wat a load of rubbish
This review is a load of rubbish. U hav no idea wat ur on about. I went out and bought Who the Fuck are the Arctic Monkeys and it is by far one of the best things i've ever heard. U need to find some decent musical taste as u obviously don't hav any. Wen u mk it as big as the Arctic Monkeys Colin Roberts i'll let u say all the tripe about them but for now zip it. Arctic Monkeys are ACE!!!!