The Arctic Monkeys haven’t been making many waves lately, but that doesn’t mean they haven’t been on the move. Their third album is locked and loaded, set for an August 25th release, and we’re betting high numbers that it’ll blow the roof off previous concepts and expectations about the band. One good reason? They’ve been brought into the hive of Queens Of The Stone Age nucleus Josh Homme.
The Monkeys recruited two producers for the new LP, which is so far untitled. One of those is a familiar face: Simian Mobile Disco’s James Ford, who co-produced the band’s moderately rougher, brawnier second album, Favourite Worst Nightmare. But the other producer is just about as thrilling as a rock band can ever hope to get: Desert Queen Josh Homme, who worked with the band in his Mojave Desert studio- home of the infamous Desert Sessions recordings.
Here’s a bit of blurry, thumb-obscured evidence:
Drummer Matt Helders had nothing but good things to say about the sessions in a recent interview with BBC 6Music. “We did a few days in the desert and it was amazing,” he said. “The studio is just like a house that’s converted into a studio, but the area surrounding it… you’ve never really seen anything like it.
“Before we went, he [Homme] was saying that special things happen there. We were like, ‘What can he mean?’ But it really had quite an effect on us.”
Hmm. What do you think?
Pre-Homme Monkeys
Post-Homme Monkeys:
Homme appeared on Biffy Clyro’s BBC Radio 1 takeover earlier this year and did a bit of gushing himself. “Oh man, it was great. We spent most of the time in Joshua Tree and it was really cool to be present and watch them go nuts,” he said.
Clyro singer Simon Neil asked if they’d pulled a Doors and taken peyote during the session, to which Homme replied “Well I did, but I didn’t tell them, so there were just a few days when they were like ‘Why are you being so weird?’ I didn’t think it was weird, I just said the word ‘Ham’ 4,000 times.”
Homme has spent the past several years establishing himself as not only a beacon for the kind of balls-out swagger that rock n’ roll is so desperately lacking these days, but also as the centerpiece for a larger movement of like-minded musicians including sometime bandmembers Dave Grohl, Mark Lanegan, PJ Harvey, Jesse Hughes and Troy Van Leeuwen, for starters. His resume is utterly airtight, and you’d be hard-pressed to find a cooler, more revered guy in rock.
One thing’s for sure- if Josh has anything to do with it, you can bet your ridiculous hipster girl-pants that this album is going to kick almighty ass. One can bet that we’ll see quite a heavy desert rock influence. So what if Alex looks like Conor Oberst now? As long as he doesn’t start singing off-key bullshit ex-girlfriend melodies, we’re good to go.
The tracklist for the album, which has yet to be officially named:
1. My Propeller
2. Crying Lightning
3. Dangerous Animals
4. Secret Door
5. Potion Approaching
6. Fire And The Thud
7. Cornerstone
8. Dance Little Liar
9. Pretty Visitors
10. The Jeweller’s Hands
haha that before and after shit is great. i can’t even figure out which dude is which. the one dude seems to have metamorphosed into the wrong kinda queen, but the rest of them finally look like men.
very excited for this. was already a big arctic monkeys fan (one of few british darling bands actually worth the hype), and homme’s the fucking man.
This is going to be too awesome.
Arctic Hommkeys! Heard about it quite some time ago, and now ther’s this news… Interesting! And the before/after pic is fucking outrageous!
I wonder how well arctic beings can adapt to the desert?
Damn, after Homme was done with them the one dude put on a purple shirt and a faggity sweater over it. Good lord.
yeah seriously, that chubby dude apparently got way gayer.
[...] Humbug is set to hit shelves on August 25th. Further details on Homme’s contributions can be found here. [...]
hey guys, yeah that changed a lot, but they also replaced a member ;-) dude on the right (Andy Nicholson) of the first picture left after album 1 and was replaced by said “wrong kinda queen” (Nick O’Malley). That’s why they look different : they are different people ;-)
ahh… haha. well that sort of makes sense. but i still can’t figure out who’s who. i recognize the singer in both photos, but besides that it looks like 3 different guys in each.
yeah but they were veeeery young when they started, so they started getting pubes and stuff. Especially the drummer who looked like a baby, rosy cheeks and all. Guitarist’s now all tough, with kings of leon look + Sabbath tee
from right to left, old pic :
Jamie Cook (gtr), Alex Turner (vox), Matt Helders (drums), Andy Nicholson (bass)
new pic
Helders, Nick O’Malley (bass), Turner, Cook.
ahh… well the “wrong kinda queen” is matt then, not nick. now it kinda makes sense. thanks for clearing that up!
[...] Humbug, for awhile now; even before the news broke that Joshua Homme of Queens Of The Stone Age would be co-producing it. It’s no secret that we’re huge fans of J.Ho, but we were already confident that the [...]