Arctic Monkeys may be on their way to Australia to appear at the Big Day Out in 2009, but at least two members of the Sheffield born four-piece have been moonlighting in other guises for the majority of 2008. Frontman Alex Turner teamed with the Rascals’ Miles Kane as The Last Shadow Puppets, wowing audiences with their take on Scott Walker-like pop pomp. But Matt Helders, drummer for Arctic Monkeys, has gone in a different direction completely – he’s downed the sticks and taken up the turntables, and has put together his own Late Night Tales compilation for audiences.
“I got asked to do it and I’d not heard of the thing before,” he admits, “so I didn’t know what the story was. They sent me copies of other people that had done them – like the Flaming Lips and Fatboy Slim – and I thought it looked like quite a cool thing to do. When it came down to it they’re probably my favourite songs and they’re probably the sort of songs that I’d play after I’d been out for a night or after I’d DJed, when you’re winding down a bit.”
Before Arctic Monkeys became the biggest sensation in British music since Oasis, Matt was involved in the DJ culture, playing shows and creating mixes, before putting the equipment away as his ‘day job’ with Arctic Monkeys kept him busy. “Probably a couple of years ago I bought some decks and got back into it, with the remixing and stuff. It’s fun to do it.”
What influence or impact has it had upon being a drummer? “I don’t think it does so consciously,” Matt says, “but I think the drumming might have helped the DJing – obviously it’s all about keeping time and knowing about beats. The kind of things I play when I DJ (hip hop and that kind of stuff) there’s a lot of interesting sounds that you can’t really create with a drumkit, but they’re influential on a lot of things that I do.”
Putting together the mix, it wasn’t so much the individual tracks that Matt was thinking about, but instead the beats and the way that it worked together. “One thing I wanted a lot of the tracks to have was good riffs and a good feel to it,” he explains. “Not necessarily rhythms and all different kinds of rhythms but things that worked well together like good grooves. Even though there’s a lot of different stuff on there I think it’s all got a good beat to it.”
The final track on his Late Night Tales is the exception – it comes instead in the form of a spoken word piece from Alex Turner, frontman for Arctic Monkeys. “That’s something that [the organisers behind the Late Night Tales series] told me – you can do a cover and also a spoken word thing,” Matt explains. “They always go on the end and they’re not part of your tracklisting – it was a good thing at the time and for Alex as well, because he’s not really done anything like that before. He’s written things that he can’t use in songs really, but to get the opportunity to write a short story for someone who is a writer is quite an exciting thing to do.”
Alex has an amazing gift for words – when a short story like this comes up, does it surprise even you? “I think when you actually hear it and it were something different than what I’ve actually heard before then you still get surprised by it. That’s why it were an interesting thing – he were good at doing that, the story thing.”
Matt Helders’ Late Night Tales is out this weekend Azuli Records/Stomp. Check out the tracklisting below.
sHaRp-b0y says...
Check out the tracklisting below........?
chanellyscs says...
wow, didn't hear about this one coming out... exciting news!