FEATURE:
Revisiting…
Arctic Monkeys - Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino
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IN this feature…
where I look back at great albums from the past five years that are underrated or under-played, it leads me to the latest album from Arctic Monkeys. Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino was released in May 2018. It was written by band frontman Alex Turner in 2016 on a Steinway Vertegrand piano in his Los Angeles home. A lot of critics were quite sniffy and critical of the sixth studio album by the Sheffield band. Some felt it was a departure from their Rock foundation; maybe a bit too weird or overly-gentle for an Arctic Monkeys release. I really love the album. I am going to end with a couple of positive reviews for the superb Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino. I have written about the album a couple of times before. Each time, I have sort of had to defend it against criticism and a reputation as not being a typical Arctic Monkeys album. Even so, there were a lot of positive reviews for the album. I think that, four years after its release, it remains undervalued and sort of placed low among the best albums from Arctic Monkeys. Taking inspiration from Lounge and Glam Rock, there is a mix of styles. It is a definite move away from the sound of the previous album, AM. That was released five years prior to Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino. Reaching number one in the U.K. and hitting the top ten in the U.S., the album was a big success. It is unfortunate that there were some mixed reviews for a mighty album that is really interesting.
If you have not heard Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino, then spend some time exploring all the richness of a wonderful work. My personal favourite songs are American Sports and Four Out of Five. Featuring some of Alex Turner’s exceptional and poetic lyrics and wonderful compositions, everyone needs to hear Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino. This is what NME said in their review:
“Composed initially on a piano by Turner in his LA pad, these songs were given the go-ahead by guitarist Jamie Cook, who felt they were appropriate enough for the band to record. ‘Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino’, however, is as close as we’ve ever been to hearing an Alex Turner solo record, outside of his solo soundtrack for 2010 film Submarine. There’s a noticeable lack of workable choruses, several of the songs feature a leisurely pace that’s a far cry from most of the Monkeys’ material, and most of the 40-minute record is occupied by Turner’s crooning. From the opening drawl of “I just wanted to be one of the Strokes/now look at the mess you made me make”, it’s evident that he’s not just the architect of this lavish establishment – he’s the concierge, towel boy, bartender and everything in between.
That’s not to discredit the performances from the rest of the band. They’ve turned what might have resembled a spiritual sequel to Father John Misty’s moody 2016 album ‘Pure Comedy’ into a fleshed-out, Bowie-esque statement of excess and grandeur. Lavish strings populate ‘One Point Perspective’, and album closer ‘The Ultracheese’ is one of the band’s finest collective achievements to date – like ‘Que Sera, Sera’, but with a gorgeous guitar solo. Drummer Matt Helders, whose skills are a tad underused on this record, has found a place by experimenting on synths for several tracks, while bassist Nick O’Malley turns in another steady effort with fantastic harmony work and irresistible basslines. ‘Four Out Of Five’ will feel the most familiar, existing as a compromise between some of ‘Suck It And See’’s poppiest arrangements and the ‘70s West Coast vibe that dominated The Last Shadow Puppets’ last record ‘Everything You’ve Come To Expect’.
‘Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino’ will reward deep-diving listeners – in particular those with an interest in picking apart Turner’s densest and most self-aware lyrics to date. He dabbles with religion, (“emergency battery pack just in time for my weekly chat with God on videocall), technology (“my virtual reality mask is stuck on ‘Parliament Brawl’) and politics (“the leader of the free world reminds you of a wrestler wearing tight golden trunks”). There’s zingers on here too, and some of the best quips come when things get a bit silly – from Blade Runner references to illusions of “Jesus in the day spa” and self-deprecating moments of being “full of shite”. Plus, Turner manages to turn “who are you going to call, The Martini Police?” into a serviceable chorus on ‘The Star Treatment’. It’s a bloody miracle.
Even if it doesn’t feel like it immediately, the Monkeys’ DNA does inhabit these new songs. ‘Golden Trunks’ has as raw and brooding a riff as anything on ‘AM’, and there’s a distinct ‘Humbug’ feel to songs like ‘Science Fiction’ and ‘Batphone’. The Sheffield band’s journey has now taken them from “chip-shop rock’n’roll”, in Turner’s own words, to their very own ‘Pet Sounds’: the threads have been dangling for years, but Turner’s finally tied them together in a rather magnificent bow. Depending on where you’re sitting, this album will likely either be a bitter disappointment or a glorious step forward. But to where, exactly?
The album’s title is a fitting one: this record feels a lot like gazing into the night sky. At first it’s completely overwhelming – you’ll be trying to connect the scattered dots on this initially impenetrable listen, and maybe even despairing when it doesn’t all come together. But when the constellations show through, you’ll realise that it’s a product of searingly intelligent design”.
I will finish up with a review from The Guardian. There were a lot of three-star reviews. People a bit unconvinced or finding merit on some tracks. This review is a little more positive:
“Other artists have laboured the fame/space metaphor before; the Weeknd is only the most recent. Turner is, obliquely, dealing with being a “motherfucking starboy”, doing some work on himself, and writing about writing; his gift is such that he can carry this solo-album-under-another-name. Hilariously, the album opens with the line “I just wanted to be one of the Strokes”; a jawdropping admission from one of music’s best beaters-around-the-bush. Even better is Batphone’s imagined scent. “I launch my fragrance called ‘Integrity’,” intones Turner, eyebrow making a parabola. “I sell the fact that I can’t be bought.”
The Starboy analogy works because, just as AM fed rock through the west coast genres, this album feeds lounge music through it too. One Point Perspective starts with dink-dink-dink keys, whose vibes recall Dr Dre on Still DRE. There are breakbeats here and there, and subtle funk. The new ingredients, though, are soul and 60s film soundtracks. The vintage loveliness of Curtis Mayfield and his ilk hits you from the off on Star Treatment; retro keyboard sounds abound. The amazing Four Out of Five partially recycles Cook’s bejewelled riff from Do I Wanna Know? and elides it with the memory of Lou Reed’s Satellite of Love (“take it easy for a little while”). The album exists in a narrow bandwidth of sound but that strip reveals depths and textures over time.
Buried inside scenarios, allusions and lunar perspectives are disarming moments of what you might laughably call “realness” in the hall of mirrors that is art. “So I tried to write a song to make you blush,” sings Turner, “but I’ve a feeling that the whole thing may well just end up too clever for its own good, the way some science fiction does.” There is a risk that this atmospheric record, one that wrong-foots expectation, might not land well. But this voyage into themed purgatory – what one song calls the Ultracheese – is worth it”.
An exceptional album that is among the most underrated or 2018, I do wonder what Arctic Monkeys will do next. There are rumours that there is an album coming from them this year. That would be great news. I think people need to revisit Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino. A different sound to what a lot of fans are used to, go and listen to it. It is album that I have no hesitation…
POINTING people in the direction of.