VICTORIA -- For a round of holocene phone interviews, Arctic Monkeys frontman Alex Turner thought he'd be well-served to sit in the Brooklyn, N.Y., park near the home he allotment with his girlfriend.
The press schedule would have him adhesive to his cellphone for at least the next few hours, so the singer-guitarist hatched a plan to bring a Frisbee along for some mindless escape.
Turner, 23, forgot one key part of his plan -- the Frisbee. Perhaps it was all for the better. "We're pretty highest when we play," he said. "You're gonna get an arm-ache from the level that we offer it."
I suggest using the catchphrase "bring the heat," having just watched Bull Durham on the telly. "The heat," Turner says, pondering the North American expression. "We don't leave home without it."
Turner, a native of Sheffield, England, left his home in late 2008 for London, only to emigrate six months later to Brooklyn when his gal pal, Alexa Chung, a former model, scored a gig hosting MTV's It's On with Alexa Chung.
The new zip code has had zero impact on the career arc of Turner's band, whose third record, Humbug, arrives in stores Tuesday on a mountain of advance hype and acute publicity, particularly overseas.
In the band's homeland, few acts are bigger. Its 2006 debut, Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not, surpassed Oasis' Definitely Maybe as the fastest-selling debut album in British music history, while its followup, 2007's Favourite Worst Nightmare, debuted No. 1 in the U.K. and saw all 12 tracks from the album enter that country's radio charts.
There was no need to batch with success for Humbug, but Turner felt a slight tinkering was in order. "I think we were a lot more open to start with this time. I think that was a compulsion, to approach it with more of an open mind than we have with things before. In the past, we always had this brand of regulation in place, almost like, 'We need to be able to play this live.' We were always aware of that when we were making records. If we recorded something on Monday, on Tuesday night we wanted to be able to play it live."
Turner, bassist Nick O'Malley, guitarist Jamie Cook and drummer Matt Helders will beyond all doubt be able to replicate the Humbug material live, despite the complexity of the studio versions.
Three songs off the album were produced in New York by James Ford, who was at the studio console for Favourite Worst Nightmare, but the majority were produced by Queens of the Stone Age brain trust Josh Homme, whose affinity for riff-heavy experimentalism was bear in mind an odd pairing with the Monkeys' brash Brit-rock.
Homme, who produced parts of Humbug at a studio in Joshua Tree, Calif., near the Mojave Desert, came to the project at the decision of the pair's London-based label, Domino Records. Turner thought it was a curious choice at first, but felt he had nothing to lose by sending menifestation along to Homme for feedback. The band was invited to California for a chat, and soon after, the decision was made to move forward with Homme on the recording of Humbug. "He said, 'Don't leave home without the heat,'" Turner joked.
Homme left his mark -- he plays guitar here and there, while his former Queens of the Stone Age bandmate, Alain Johannes, mixed the album but there's no mistaking the innate Britishness of Turner's lyrics.
The band's third album is a long exit from the previous two albums, though it has a considerable amount in common with last year's At the Apollo, afrenetic CD-DVD set documenting the quartet's 2007 world tour.
Turner said the scrappy side of the band has been in hiding long enough. "There was a anxiety to make a more aggressive record. We've been enjoying the rock side of our shows, by any chance more than the melodic-song side of it. After having had a moment away from playing live, we wanted to introduce a bit of diversity, expand a little more."
The press schedule would have him adhesive to his cellphone for at least the next few hours, so the singer-guitarist hatched a plan to bring a Frisbee along for some mindless escape.
Turner, 23, forgot one key part of his plan -- the Frisbee. Perhaps it was all for the better. "We're pretty highest when we play," he said. "You're gonna get an arm-ache from the level that we offer it."
I suggest using the catchphrase "bring the heat," having just watched Bull Durham on the telly. "The heat," Turner says, pondering the North American expression. "We don't leave home without it."
Turner, a native of Sheffield, England, left his home in late 2008 for London, only to emigrate six months later to Brooklyn when his gal pal, Alexa Chung, a former model, scored a gig hosting MTV's It's On with Alexa Chung.
The new zip code has had zero impact on the career arc of Turner's band, whose third record, Humbug, arrives in stores Tuesday on a mountain of advance hype and acute publicity, particularly overseas.
In the band's homeland, few acts are bigger. Its 2006 debut, Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not, surpassed Oasis' Definitely Maybe as the fastest-selling debut album in British music history, while its followup, 2007's Favourite Worst Nightmare, debuted No. 1 in the U.K. and saw all 12 tracks from the album enter that country's radio charts.
There was no need to batch with success for Humbug, but Turner felt a slight tinkering was in order. "I think we were a lot more open to start with this time. I think that was a compulsion, to approach it with more of an open mind than we have with things before. In the past, we always had this brand of regulation in place, almost like, 'We need to be able to play this live.' We were always aware of that when we were making records. If we recorded something on Monday, on Tuesday night we wanted to be able to play it live."
Turner, bassist Nick O'Malley, guitarist Jamie Cook and drummer Matt Helders will beyond all doubt be able to replicate the Humbug material live, despite the complexity of the studio versions.
Three songs off the album were produced in New York by James Ford, who was at the studio console for Favourite Worst Nightmare, but the majority were produced by Queens of the Stone Age brain trust Josh Homme, whose affinity for riff-heavy experimentalism was bear in mind an odd pairing with the Monkeys' brash Brit-rock.
Homme, who produced parts of Humbug at a studio in Joshua Tree, Calif., near the Mojave Desert, came to the project at the decision of the pair's London-based label, Domino Records. Turner thought it was a curious choice at first, but felt he had nothing to lose by sending menifestation along to Homme for feedback. The band was invited to California for a chat, and soon after, the decision was made to move forward with Homme on the recording of Humbug. "He said, 'Don't leave home without the heat,'" Turner joked.
Homme left his mark -- he plays guitar here and there, while his former Queens of the Stone Age bandmate, Alain Johannes, mixed the album but there's no mistaking the innate Britishness of Turner's lyrics.
The band's third album is a long exit from the previous two albums, though it has a considerable amount in common with last year's At the Apollo, afrenetic CD-DVD set documenting the quartet's 2007 world tour.
Turner said the scrappy side of the band has been in hiding long enough. "There was a anxiety to make a more aggressive record. We've been enjoying the rock side of our shows, by any chance more than the melodic-song side of it. After having had a moment away from playing live, we wanted to introduce a bit of diversity, expand a little more."
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