![\"Arctic-Monkeys-Issue-No29\"](\"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/10\/Arctic-Monkeys-Issue-No29.jpg\")
<\/h1>\n<\/h1>\nFour albums\u2014and seven years\u2014after releasing their debut, Whatever People Say I Am, That\u2019s What I\u2019m Not<\/i>, the Arctic Monkeys\u2019 latest record, AM<\/i>, finds the band tapping into R&B melodies to shake up their guitar-driven sound. \u201cWe started with, \u2018What if you go with Aaliyah melodies and riffs from Black Sabbath?\u2019\u201d says frontman Alex Turner. \u201cSome of the grooves in that world matched up perfectly with those melodies. That was the initial idea, but then we began to experiment.\u201d Lending a hand with the experiments were producer James Ford, Bill Ryder-Jones, Josh Homme, and Elvis Costello\u2019s drummer Pete Thomas.<\/p>\n
What\u2019s the genesis of the album?<\/b><\/p>\n
Last summer we went to Joshua Tree for a couple of weeks to gather our thoughts and start cooking up something. And we worked right through to May this year. It\u2019s been a long road. The majority of the recording was done in Los Angeles. You could say we browned the garlic and softened the onions, but the roasting was done in L.A.<\/p>\n
Why do you always select James Ford?<\/b><\/p>\n
He\u2019s been involved with every record\u2014he\u2019s sort of like the fifth member. He knows how to navigate the flying saucer. We finish each other\u2019s sentences at this point. This record is a lot more of a studio record. The records we made up to now sound like a band playing, and I think this one is less so. We were following elements of different corners of the musical universe, putting together some chemicals that don\u2019t usually mix. There\u2019s delicate balance in that. To do that I thought it would be best to have a producer we understand but who also understands us.<\/p>\n
Were you aiming for an R&B feel?<\/b><\/p>\n
There was this one song that was the impetus behind the whole thing called \u201cR U Mine?\u201d that we previously put out. We were experimenting more with vocal production and borrowing some tricks and scales from contemporary R&B. I call them \u201ctwo-way pager melodies\u201d\u2014the kind of melodies that accompany lyrics about two-way pagers from 10 or 15 years ago, like Aaliyah, Ashanti, M\u00fda, things from that world. There\u2019s this thing they always do with some of that music where a backup vocal echoes in time, and then lingers around. The chorus on \u201cR U Mine?\u201d borrows that move. All that vocal production was the most exciting part of that song. We wanted to make a record that surrounded that. So the R&B thing was there from the beginning.<\/p>\n
How did Bill Ryder-Jones end up on the record?<\/b><\/p>\n
Bill\u2019s a good friend and a really terrific guitar player and a great songwriter. He put out his own album, which we all love. \u201cFireside,\u201d the song he\u2019s featured on, is probably the most melancholic moment on the record, and I wanted a guitar part that reflected the longing that song addresses. Longing is like a liquid, and it\u2019s not something you sail smoothly through. It seems to have a rolling boil to it. I wanted the rhythm of the song to reflect that feeling.<\/p>\n
How about Pete Thomas?<\/b><\/p>\n
It was a product of circumstances. Matt [Helders] busted up his hand, and he couldn\u2019t play\u2014but we wanted to keep experimenting to work out the knots in the songs. So we had Pete come down and had a great few weeks. He\u2019s a great guy and a fantastic drummer. There are some tunes on there that, without his enthusiasm, wouldn\u2019t have come to fruition.<\/p>\n
\u2013Amanda Farah<\/p>\n
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ARCTIC MONKEYS The English indie rockers dive into an R&B groove on their new set\u00a0 Four albums\u2014and seven years\u2014after releasing their debut, Whatever People Say I Am, That\u2019s What I\u2019m Not, the Arctic Monkeys\u2019 latest record, AM, finds the band tapping into R&B melodies to shake up their guitar-driven sound. \u201cWe started with, \u2018What if […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[23,7],"tags":[2429,7093],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11038"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11038"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11038\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11041,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11038\/revisions\/11041"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11038"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11038"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11038"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}