Everybody Is Wrong: The Arctic Monkeys
Oh yes. It’s back.
Those of you who have been with hecklerspray from the beginning will remember Everybody Is Wrong - a weekly feature in which we took a film/ TV show/ band/ album/ celebrity widely heralded by the masses as being brilliant and tried our darndest to prove the opposite.
New year, new start, new resurgence. Everybody Is Wrong has returned. And who is our first target?
It’s those cheeky chappies The Arctic Monkeys.
Not since the godforsaken days of Travis has hecklerspray been so utterly perplexed as to why a band has been clutched so tightly to the bosom of the public as The Arctic Monkeys (CDs). But here’s the rub: this isn’t just a generally plebeian thing. Oh, no – serious music critics have been getting in on the act too.
It goes without saying that the NME loves the Arctic Monkeys – but ever since the NME decided to become a spirit-free weekly fashion rag, all it really takes for them to herald a musician as possessing ‘genius’ is a pork pie hat, stripy top and public school education. Acclaim from them is by now no means an ‘achievement’; rather, it’s starting to become something that prospective bands should actually avoid.
hecklerspray is thinking more of the likes of Andrew Collins – an esteemed, clued-up cultural commentator whose feature about the Arctic Monkeys in this month’s Word Magazine seems to imply that he has lost his mind completely.
Collins describes the group as – wait for it – "the most exciting band he has heard since The Smiths." A comparison akin to claiming Chucklevision is the best TV show ever seen since The Singing Detective – i.e an insanely wrong one.
The truth about The Arctic Monkeys is as follows. Ready? Alrighty, then.
They really aren’t very good.
Face facts. In much the same way that Dire Straits sold a billion squillion copies of Brothers In Arms by being the first major ‘CD’ band, so The Arctic Monkeys will be forever linked with the method of their success rather than the execution.
Is it an achievement to be the first group to – genuinely – use the Internet as a springboard to huge public success? Yes.
Does that change the fact that their music is of such soul-sapping mediocrity that it produces a hecklerspray yawn roughly wide enough to fly a space shuttle through? Afraid not.
I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor? That’s the supposed ‘voice of a generation’ letting rip? That’s the best our culture can do? Christ – even Pete Doherty could come up with something more poetic than that, and let’s not forget that he possesses about as much literary talent as a developmentally-disabled pubic louse.
Oh. And it’s a rubbish name for a band, too ….
Read More:
Monkeys Set For Record Breaking Debut - Digital Spy
[story by C J Davies]
Far be it from me to react to such an obvious piece of attention seeking, but I feel that if I don’t, the writer of “Everybody Is Wrong: The Arctic Monkeys” may turn his or her attention to kicking small children or setting fire to garden sheds and the like.
Firstly, if you wish to present yourself as credible, you really should get the name of the band you’re critiquing correct. I’ll let you ‘research’ the name yourself.
It goes without saying that a writer should approach a subject of this kind with a neutral eye, but from your simpering attack on NME, it’s clear that there’s an agenda behind the article.
How’s this? Instead of saying “Everybody, everybody, look at me, I know best, everyone else knows nothing, I’m the lone intelligent voice, LISTEN TO ME”, take a deep breath, pour a glass of water and indulge in bout of self-gratification.
Thanks for the article though. Top read.
the lead singer of the monkey does have a very good presence and definatly song writing abilities,his band thought are quite quite awful,`i bet you…` the instrumentation is mind bleeding,i like thrash,crash,bass etc.but you`ve got to be able to control your instrument,the singer is very headstrong,i don`t think the band will last around him,he`s on different level!
What the fuck are you on about? You obviously know JACK SHITE about music and british culture in general Arctic Monkeys are fresh vibrant with lyrics so culturally astute that they will be heralded as the voice of cool britannia. As for Pete doherty having no literary talent, well i am not his biggest fan, I think he is a tosser if the truth be known but I most definately would not question his literary knowledge. Do some research or shut the fuck up knobhead!!!
Arctic Monkeys? Simpering Simians more like. All that posturing is just the antithesis of cool. Mozza would stamp on his daffodils in disgust at being mentioned in the same sentence.
Ha ha ha! Thanks CJ Davies for saying what a lot of us are all thinking. “The” Arctic Monkeys (as if that matters) are nothing special. Releasing songs on the internet, singing in a regional accent and crowbarring references to other songs (Roxanne, Rio)into your own dross should not automatically make you The Next Big Thing. But implying that Pete Doherty is better than them. No, you’ve really gone too far there.
er pete dohertys a star
He was academically successful, achieving 11 A* grade GCSEs, at Nicholas Chamberlaine Comprehensive School in Bedworth in his GCSE examinations, and four A grades at A Level in general studies, history, English literature and economics. At the age of 16, he won a poetry competition and embarked on a tour of Russia organised by the British Council. He was accepted for an English course at Oxford University, but dropped out in his first year.
Tried to post before but it didn’t work, so if it is a double post…….YOU SUCK!!!!!
The Arctic Monkeys managed to make the NME list of ‘The Greatest British Albums Ever’ at number 5.
Any music magazine who have honestly rated Arctic Monkeys 3 places above London Calling by the Clash need to go back to the school of rock.
Not that I have anything against the Arctic Monkeys, thier first album is a refreshing change from the constant barrage of teeny pop, nu-metal and RnB. However the sycophants at NME need to stop attmepting to create trends and go back to what it made its name for.. developing grass roots music.
You love him don’t you Steve? How clever he is..
that post was about pete doherty btw who allegedly “possesses about as much literary talent as a developmentally-disabled pubic louse.” Looks like he’s quite poetic as well. I’m just clearing that up….
And the Arctic monkeys rule.
Well spank my nuts and call me Trudy! I seem to have forgotten that Pete Doherty was the new Lord Byron. Well, clever as he may be, that really doesn’t necessarily mean he’s a great poet. He’s certainly got some good ideas but great? Can we take a deep collective sigh and be proud of our country’s writers who are great and not actually lump them with Doherty. He ain’t Byron, he ain’t Keats, hell, he ain’t even Ray Davies. I wish he’d get his act together before he turns into the David Crosby of our time.
He may be charismatic, he may have fooled a supermodel into bed with him – but Lord Byron he isn’t. He needs to pull his finger out and actually prove himself against his detractors. Anyway, Arcade Fire are clearly the only recent new band of any long-term note, and even then they might balls it up. Where’s our collective view of reality gone?
To put it simply, the Arctic Monkeys = oh dear… what is the music industry coming to, first we were tortured with franz ferdinand, then kaiser chiefs now this. It will soon be over though, a few years from now… “Arctic who?”. Enough said
I enjoyed a few of their songs when I heard them on Radio 1 about 4 months ago, but never thought twice about them. To me they weren’t that good, and this hype has been created to cover up the fact that they are average at best.
aren’t you eating your words now?