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#18
Arctic Monkeys | Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino
Domino
According to Kate Seldman: “Sheffield’s Arctic Monkeys are known for their stylistic switch-ups, but this one’s a corker: they’ve gone and made a sci-fi lounge concept album—and it’s brilliant.
Despite being their biggest musical departure to date, this is unmistakably an Arctic Monkeys album. The sound is big, echoing, cosmos-spanning—there’s barely any trace of the frenetic rock that characterized their 2006 debut LP Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not. The songs are much more loosely structured than the tracks on their last album, 2013’s AM—they meander, as do Turner’s stream-of-consciousness, space-inspired lyrics.
For a band that wasn’t sure they could commit to Turner’s new space-age musical direction, the Arctics have knocked it out of the park, creating a sonic landscape filled with echoing synths and hazy piano, and vocals that sound as if Turner recorded them while floating in a tin can.
It’ll take several listens to navigate through every twist and turn of this adventurous album, but it’s well worth the trip.”
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