Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not
ARCTIC MONKEYS
Domino
OK, so we're a little late on this one — sue us. Unless you've been strip mining the rain forests or keeping Aerosmith greatest hits on a continuous loop for the last month or so, you've heard the buzz about Arctic Monkeys. A loud fookin' buzz, that. The four pimply-faced lads from Sheffield, England (slightly east of Manchester) have generated more drooling reviews than anyone since The Strokes, and they might've even outdone that New York outfit. The Monkeys are ablaze in their homeland — Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not has been the fastest-selling debut album in that country's history.
So, the obvious question: Do the Arctic Monkeys merit the hype? I'm not sure that any band ever does, but these guys at least live up to the kudos with a viscerally powerful brand of rock that's built from punk up, but willfully digresses from the genre's orthodoxies.
Knotty guitar chords and licks spar with each other, rhythms shift, the band launches into a few middle-section breaks that bring to mind a postmodern version of The Who. They even attempt, rather clumsily, a few guitar solos. Yet somehow, the music avoids falling into art-rock pretentiousness. These songs hang together.
Much of the disc's singular character is the product of lead singer/guitarist/lyricist Alex Turner, 20, who has a canny way of evoking post-adolescent life in urban England. He tells stories of chatting up chicks in the club, dodging cops, getting dissed by bouncers and rival bands; these slice-of-life vignettes range emotionally from defiant cynicism to weary resignation.
Not surprisingly, Turner's primary guise is a sneer, but he's also capable of tenderness. The album's lone ballad, "Riot Van," fondly chronicles a group of bored friends playing cat-and-mouse with police: "Up rolled the riot van/ And these lads just wind the coppers up/ Ask why they don't catch proper crooks/ Get their address and their name's took/ But they couldn't care less."
The Arctic Monkeys are unremitting in their north-Englishness, liberally dropping slang. Turner does nothing to temper his accent; he makes Liam Gallagher sound like Mike Wallace.
In all, the Arctic Monkeys' debut resonates with uncommon vision and maturity for a band so young. 3.5 stars Eric Snider
The Essential Chieftains
THE CHIEFTAINS
RCA Victor/Legacy
Just in time to be a week late for St. Patty's day, we review this vibrant two-disc retrospective by Ireland's preeminent musical ambassadors, The Chieftains. Disc one contains the traditional reels, jigs, hornpipes, waltzes and such — celebratory music built around buoyant rhythms and cyclical melodies rendered by overlapping acoustic instruments: tin whistles, Uilleann pipes, fiddles, the bodhrán hand drum and more. Celt-rock fans would do well to check this stuff out, so you can better understand where the Dropkicks and the like get their indigenous inspiration. The second disc showcases The Chieftains' deep resume of collaborations, from frothy pop with the Coors to a hymn-like "Shenandoah" with Van Morrison. A song like "Country Blues," where the band backs Buddy & Julie Miller, really helps connect the dots between Celtic and Appalachian styles. And if you like the song "Cotton-Eyed Joe" but the wedding version makes you nauseous, don't miss the hoe-down here, pairing the Chieftains with Ricky Skaggs. 4 stars ES
Ballad of the Broken Seas
ISOBEL CAMPBELL & MARK LANEGAN
V2
The chamber-pop princess meets the world-weary balladeer — again. Belle & Sebastian cellist/vocalist Isobel Campbell joined forces with former Screaming Trees frontman and Queens of the Stone Age collaborator (not to mention top-notch solo act) Mark Lanegan for last year's Ramblin' Man, a short, four-song EP anchored by that Hank Williams tune; it, and another tune from the EP "(Do You Wanna) Come Walk with Me?," also appear on this engaging, largely acoustic full-length. Most of the songs on Broken Seas were penned by Campbell, and her whispery, intimate style tempers Lanegan's usual tendency toward the baroque and forcibly evocative. The results are lovely, particularly throughout the album's first half ("Black Mountain" may be the disc's best track). The downhill side starts to drag just a bit, and the sole Lanegan composition "Revolver" hints that his talents may have been underutilized, but overall this is a wonderfully sinuous listen. 4 stars Scott Harrell
This article appears in Mar 22-28, 2006.