Brandon EdwardsWhen you have the fastest selling debut album in the history of British music, you know you’re doing something right.
Now, couple that with having that same album being dubbed one of the top five British albums ever made by numerous press and media reviewers, and you have a phenomenon on your hands.
Well, that’s exactly what the Sheffield-base Arctic Monkeys are experiencing with the release of their first LP, “Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not.”
A mix of brash punk beats and gnarling guitar riffs, this 13-song masterpiece was an obvious hit with the misguided, yet musically privileged British youth demographic. They write lyrics that can be generalized down into being about clubbing and the track-suit wearing, football-loving life of any English teenager today, or what’s even more impressive, 20 years ago.
This album really does narrate to today’s and yesterday’s punk/indie generation. It works on so many levels that everyone can enjoy it and really connect with what’s being said in the 13-song outburst by the musicians of only four years.
The first six songs on the album are hard-hitting and upbeat as any CD you’ll hear. The ranging melodies and undeniably catchy guitar tunes of “Still Take You Home,” has you on a high that you think will last forever, but ends when you reach the seventh track, “Riot Van.” This is the first drop in the intense, fast-paced action of the album, as you are taken on a two-minute-and-14-second journey, which makes you truly appreciate the musical talents of these four northern-Englanders.
Once “Riot Van” concludes, the tempo picks up again, and your foot resumes tapping happily. With attractive melodies of “Mardy Bum” and “When The Sun Goes Down,” you are presented with songs that seemingly make time fly and tensions fade.
With idols like British rock heavyweights, Oasis, the Clash and the Smiths, the Arctic Monkeys have a good thing going here with this extremely impressive debut album that has millions of heads bobbing across the pond, and with 360,000 copies sold in its first week on this side of the ocean, the U.S. is catching on as well.
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Posted to the web by Brandon Edwards
