Can We Still Call Arctic Monkeys Credible?

Credibility is a phrase that gets passed around a lot when it comes to music, with everyone having their own definition of what truly makes a band credible. For arguments sake, lets say that when Arctic Monkeys started out they were a credible band. They put in a lot of work, gave out free demo tapes at early gigs and to this day are still signed to Domino, an independent label. They do however seem to have completely become the personification of what they stood against when they were just those 4 guys from Sheffield.

Pictured in 2007

Take for example the song 'Fake Tales of San Francisco', from the bands debut album, Alex Turner snarled 'You're not from New York City, you're from Rotherham'. A song that attempts to call out fakers and 'weekend rockstars', people pretending to be something they're not. It would at the time seem crazy to think that in only a few years time Alex Turner would be stood at the Brit Awards talking gibberish whilst adopting a phoney American accent that seems to be half an Elvis impression and half God knows what. Modern day Arctic Monkeys look very different to their 2006 selves, Alex Turner's go to look now seems to be a leather jacket, slick backed hair and sunglasses. It doesn't stop with the bands image, AM is a complete departure from their classic British sound and in my opinion their worst album to date. Some of the songs on AM are nothing short of terrible, 'Mad Sounds' and 'I Want It All' stand out as the albums biggest fillers.

I do in a way however respect them for the change in musical direction, it's how they not only survived but went on to become one of the biggest bands in the world and in my opinion without this move they'd be in the same boat as other Sheffield based bands of the same genre like Milburn and Reverend and the Makers. On top of this in general the music isn't bad, my favourite Arctic's albums are Suck it and See and Humbug, even AM has some pretty good tracks. I'm not debating that, it's just not the same band.

Pictured in 2014

I get that a band has to evolve to stay relevant but don't sell all your morals away as you do. They're a band I grew up with and possibly the band of my generation, they mean a lot to me in many ways. They're also the band who got into trouble for tax evasion. The band that once felt raw and original now sounds fake, Americanised and generic. I'm never going to say they don't produce great music at times, because they do but AM felt lazy, like they don't care anymore. They've lost the charm they once had and have replaced it with ego the size of Texas. On top of all of this, they seem to have developed a reputation with fans and the media that they can do no wrong, like they could release a full album just containing 40 minutes of fart sounds and people would call it groundbreaking. Maybe the persona is Rock n Roll, but to me it's selling out. You can pretend to be what you're not but you'll never be from LA and you'll always be from Sheffield. Yeah, they're a great band but are they still credible? Not in my opinion.