Album Review: “AM”

Remember when Arctic Monkeys were good? Like, really good? Remember when an Arctic Monkeys song sent you into a snotty, punky frenzy? Remember when Alex Turner’s lyrics tingled the marrow in your spine at their biting yet glossy eloquence? Remember when all the hype was totally worth it?

Back in 2006, Arctic Monkeys were a vital and important band because they exceeded all the hype. Like their predecessors the Strokes, Arctic Monkeys didn’t collapse under the weight of being “the biggest new band since Oasis.” The song “Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not” is a miraculous debut, displaying a brand of meat and potatoes rock n’ roll brimming with unparalleled wit, energy and distinction.

Then in 2007 came “Favourite Worst Nightmare,” a worthy sophomore album that subtly expanded the band’s palette in both heavy riffage and sulking balladry. And it only gets better. Another two years later, the Monkeys dropped “Humbug,” the best thing they’ve ever done.

“Humbug” brought them to Joshua Tree, where they recorded with Queens of the Stone Age frontman and rock genius Josh Homme. “Humbug” was a record that opened up a whole new palette of sounds for the Monkeys to play with, drenching their propulsive snarl and lyrical slickness in desert psychedelia and eerie atmospherics.

The great thing is, you don’t have to wait for Arctic Monkeys to pioneer contemporary rock music. It’s already happened with a number of better bands and albums. Go listen to Queens of the Stone Age’s “…Like Clockwork” or Titus Andronicus’ “The Monitor” or Iceage’s “Plowing into the Field of Love.” Go listen to literally anything but “AM.”

The band started to experiment with newer song structures and a wider variety of instruments, turning every edge of their old sound inside out to reveal new flavors. Every development in the band’s trajectory only felt more and more promising. The Monkeys were going to get weird, innovative. They were going to create new spaces for rock to flourish. They were going to be the next Clash or even the next Radiohead. Right?

“Suck It and See” came out two years later, and it was...not very good. Even among all of the album’s desert rock riffs, jangle pop hooks and garage rock arrangements, it felt uncharacteristically tame. All of the energy that was so essential to the band had drained away, leaving a set of barren tunes that could barely stitch together tired sounds from the 60s and 70s. To say the least, it was a massive disappointment. I wouldn’t go as far as to call “Suck It and See” a fall from grace, but it signaled a problematic tendency that would only grow more apparent.

Jump forward to 2013, the Monkeys were now greasers with slicked-back hair and a gig at the London Olympic Games under their belts. They named their new record “AM,” taking inspiration from the Velvet Underground, and marketed it as Black Sabbath riffs over Drake beats; a total reinvention of what Arctic Monkeys meant as a band. It sounded like it would be awesome! Like, hell, they were combining a modern musical approach with an older novelty. Basically, using the past to inform the present to make the future. That’s the stuff innovation is made out of! The only way “AM” should have turned out was at least good, if not fabulous.

No. No. No. Anything that even remotely falls under the bracket of rock music should not be as gutless, bland, formulaic, sterile and forced as the relentless snooze-fest known as “AM.” The plagues foreseen in “Suck It and See,” namely the energy-drained performances, lazy implementation of genres and complete lack of imagination, all came true in the worst possible ways. “AM” is a terrible album, with little to nothing that rocks or rolls or feels even the slightest bit invigorating.

Let’s talk a little bit about Josh Homme because he’s an important reference point here. As I mentioned earlier, he fronts Queens of the Stone Age, one of my favorite bands of all time. More than that, he’s been in Kyuss, played with Dave Grohl and John Paul Jones in Them Crooked Vultures, and produced for Iggy Pop. Homme is an insanely creative musician, and he’s the only dude who’s successfully preserved classic rock ethos by not being an old fart about it. With records like “Rated R,” “Era Vulgaris” and especially “…Like Clockwork,” Queens gave mainstream rock enough vitality to last at least another two decades.

Working with Josh Homme changes you. The desert sand never left Arctic Monkeys’ guitar amps. Those psychedelic touches and blues riffs from “Humbug?” They’re all over “Suck It and See” and “AM,” albeit in cheaper forms. And that’s the problem: they’re trying too hard to sound like Josh Homme instead of trying to think like Josh Homme.

After listening to “AM” far too many times, as well as parsing a few relevant interviews, I’ve come to conclude that the album aims to achieve two primary goals: (1) be sexy, sensual and nocturnal, and (2) be a combination of disparate influences like hip-hop/R&B and hard rock. So let’s tackle each.

In all honesty, not many contemporary rock bands understand what sexiness in music means, especially indie bands. To put it simply, sensuality is all about two things: tension and release. These two ideas must constantly be at odds until they converge into a satisfying whole. Without one or the other, what you get is frustration or apathy. “AM” does none of that. These are math equations as songs; precise and predictable to the point of boredom.

Take lead single “R U Mine?” as an example. Everything about it is awkward and stilted. The confused, mid-tempo drumming fills merely scrape by a set of flat, mechanical guitar riffs and directionless bass grooves. Lead singer Alex Turner’s vocal delivery sacrifices charisma for contrived coolness, making the track’s apparent lack of depth only more painful. The song’s bridge contains a section in which each instrument gets to individually jam out, but it’s approached in such a programmed manner that none of it really resonates.

“Arabella” lugs around on a forgettable bassline, sparse guitar arpeggios and a grating kick-snare-hi-hat backbeat. By the time the ripped-off “War Pigs” riff kicks in, the listener has already checked out. Even the guitar solo, the most exciting part of any great rock song, is a whining mess.

“I Want It All” sounds like a fresh puddle of mud. It’s so compressed and murky that the track’s under-wrought chord progressions, guitar leads and vocal melodies mix into a pile of digital vomit. In these tracks, none of those things interlock or conflict. They just skim across each other, without any tension and too much release. Songs go through one ear and out the other, creating an album that breeds apathy.

And don’t even get me started on all of those laughable attempts at swooning rock ballads. “No.1 Party Anthem” and “Mad Sounds” are practically the same song, carrying some of the album’s most pathetically clumsy hooks and tempos sluggish enough to inflict eternal sleepiness. Album closer “I Wanna Be Yours” is the worst song Arctic Monkeys have ever recorded, capturing essentially everything that is wrong with “AM” and synthesizing it all into one perfect turd, decorated with some pitifully abysmal lovelorn lyrics.

As for the whole “Black Sabbath riffs over Drake beats” shtick, I mean, okay? Nothing here feels nearly as catchy or heavy as the magic coming from Tony Iommi’s hands. Just because you play in blues scale with distortion doesn’t make you Black Sabbath. Songs as wimpy and skeletal as “Do I Wanna Know?” and “Why’d You Only Call Me When You’re High?” don’t even come close to matching the menacing brilliance of something like “Into the Void.” A classic heavy metal riff needs gusto, it needs low-end, it needs to punch you in the gut, not whimper around a landscape of droning vocal melodies and stale production. “AM” doesn’t sound heavy, it feels heavy, dense and inert.

And, wait, “Drake beats?” As in, hip-hop beats? Sounds like a great idea if it actually panned out in any significant way. Every track on “AM” has some version of the same lifeless stomp-clap backbeat, which is about as conventional a rock beat anyone could think of. Yes, hip-hop’s beats are generally programmed on a drum machine. Even so, they still have vigor and spirit. Like jazz, hip-hop beats should swing, which can be accomplished by not being a lazy musician. “Snap Out of It” and “Fireside” come close to capturing that rhythmic dynamism but fall victim to repetitiveness. Arctic Monkeys have merely slapped the most superficial elements of different genres together in hopes of creating something new, when in reality they’ve only made a gentrified piece of garbage.

I’m appalled at how bad “AM” is. Five years after its initial release, the album’s flaws have only stung more and more. “AM” doesn’t diminish the power of those first three albums, but it has reduced all of my interest in their sixth album (which, based off the teaser, sounds like a pale imitation of Tame Impala), due to come out in May.

The great thing is, you don’t have to wait for Arctic Monkeys to pioneer contemporary rock music. It’s already happened with a number of better bands and albums. Go listen to Queens of the Stone Age’s “…Like Clockwork” or Titus Andronicus’ “The Monitor” or Iceage’s “Plowing into the Field of Love.” Go listen to literally anything but “AM.”