Group of the year, album of the year, song of the year… pretty much ‘everything music related of the year’Â belongs to the Arctic Monkeys.
Their debut album, and 2006 Mercury prize winner, Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not, entered my life at the start of 2006 and has continued to grow on me throughout the year.
From the lead single, I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor, to the first track on the album, The View From The Afternoon, to the final track, A Certain Romance, the entire album - every song - is fantastic.
From catching them in a small venue when they came to Toronto, to using them as a case study on handling buzz as well as mismanaging expectations (I owe a follow-on post to this - to come in the next few days) to providing the soundtrack to my runs, the Arctic Monkeys pervasively entered my life in 2006.
Many songs on the album could have been my favourite track of the year, but I’m going to go with the lead single - I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor - the lead-in, the guitar riffs, the pounding drums, and, especially, Alex Turner’s lyrics.
I agree with Fred when he says:
But if I had to pick just one thing about the Arctic Monkeys, it would be the lyrics. Alex Turner is what you’d get if you mixed Bob Dylan and Mike Skinner. He’s a poet with a street sensibility. His songs are about real things that happen to him and his friends, but the way he tells the story, the way he delivers the line, it’s just so good.
So many tracks on the album are as good as this one, but this is the one that started it all and for that it deserves to be the symbolic song of the year.
Happy New Year everyone - here’s to a safe, successful, and healthy 2007… and one filled with excellent new music.
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