The ever-changing nature of love: The very best Arctic Monkeys love songs
Some 20 years after their formation, Arctic Monkeys are still proving to be a cultural force. It’s somewhat strange to think of the band that burst onto the scene in the early 2000s – fringed and scruffy, with demos that were doing the round on MySpace – as the slick and effortless charmsters that we know today.
The band have persistently and perhaps bravely changed their sound from the punky efforts of the Five Minutes with Arctic Monkeys and their debut album to the vintage, almost 1950s sound of Suck It and See to the riff-rock of AM. Yet one remarkably consistent facet of the Arctic Monkeys is that singer and principal songwriter Alex Turner has primarily turned to that good old-fashioned source of musical inspiration: love.
For those of us who are more or less considered Millennials, as the Arctic Monkeys grew, we did too. As such, when Turner first began writing about the nature of teenage love, we watched and listened to him mature throughout the release of the following albums.
With that, let’s revisit that journey by looking at some of the best love songs written by Turner and the Arctic Monkeys.
Arctic Monkeys’ best love songs:
‘Leave Before the Lights Come On’ – Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not (2006)
When the Sheffield foursome made it clear they were heading straight for stardom with the release of their debut album in 2006, much of the record’s content concerned the ‘kitchen sink reality’ of living in working-class Britain. For four teenage lads from Yorkshire, that ‘reality’ was finishing work or college on a Friday night and heading straight for a local disco, most likely held in a town hall.
‘Leave Before the Lights Come On’ – like much of the band’s debut – revolves around the by-now dated nature of “chatting to a few birds”, necking a few cheap shots and bottles of shit lager and stumbling home with someone you barely know, as that was all that a love life amounted to at the age of 17.
‘Only Ones Who Know’ – Favourite Worst Nightmare (2007)
By the time Favourite Worst Nightmare dropped the following year, Turner had seemingly matured, at least under the theme and duress of romance. ‘Only Ones Who Know’ was a sonic departure from the punk-based efforts of the band’s debut, as a patient and simple composition without percussion.
So too, does the song’s treatment of love depart from, say, the previous entry in this list. By this point, love was nothing to be experienced in a pair of knackered trainers covered in Carling and Sambuca. Instead, it is something to be given close and sober attention, even with all its heartaches, longings and sorrows.
‘505’ – Favourite Worst Nightmare (2007)
The band’s sophomore effort continued to showcase the emotional depth and vulnerability that had come to the surface of Turner’s songwriting. With ‘505’, Turner told the story of a long-distance relationship and all the troubles that naturally go with it.
In fact, Turner once said that ‘505’ was the “first proper love song we’ve done. As in like, ‘Oh, it’s that one person.’” Who the mystery person is exactly is unknown, but ‘505’ is a beautiful song that depicts someone imagining their lover waiting on the other side of a journey but who will ultimately be disappointed by the reality that awaits them.
‘Cornerstone’ – Humbug (2009)
Two years later, Arctic Monkeys released arguably their finest-ever album in the shape of Humbug. While much of the record incorporates a dark, desert-rock-influenced sound, it also features one of their finest love songs, ‘Cornerstone’, a major key departure from the rest of the LP.
‘Cornerstone’ sees Turner go looking for a long-lost love, mainly in the boozers of his (or the narrator’s) past. He is guided by memories of his former lover and sees their ghost around town before deciding that it might just be best to settle for their sister instead. Turner once said of the song: “When I was in school, I think I probably fancied my girlfriend’s sister or something.”
‘She’s Thunderstorms’ – Suck It and See (2011)
Perhaps by the time the band’s fourth album, Suck It and See, was issued in 2011, Turner had lyrically explored the messy naivety of youthful lust, the first hints of emotional maturity and the wistful nature of nostalgic longing. Now, it was time, at least for a short while, to get a bit sexy.
‘She’s Thunderstorms’ opens Suck It and See and sees Turner likening his sexual infatuation for his partner to a storm. Although the song does remain a sweet-natured love song, it had Turner letting loose a little on the eroticism.
‘Suck It and See’ – Suck It and See (2011)
Elsewhere on Suck It and See, Turner attempted more traditional efforts at love songs. The album’s titular track continues to see Turner completely infatuated, though this time, it is from an emotional rather than a sexual perspective.
In some ways, the lyrics show the self-destructive nature of infatuation, with Turner asking for his potential lover to “be cruel” to him and to aim their shotgun at him (figurative, of course). This is despite knowing that the person in question has a face that will likely break his heart.
‘Love is a Laserquest’ – Suck It and See (2011)
Arguably one of Arctic Monkey’s most sonically-sombre sounding tracks, ‘Love is a Laserquest’ sees Turner return to the nostalgic longing that he expresses in ‘Cornerstone’. This time around, however, he knows that it is unlikely to reignite his old flame and instead appears remorseful and wistful at his prior relationship.
Turner reflects on an old lover, knowing they are likely to either be breaking other people’s hearts or wrapped happily in the arms of someone who was right for them. Regardless, he has now had to resort to tricking himself into thinking they were “just some lover” and not the person he wished he was with now.
‘Why’d You Only Call Me When You’re High?’ – AM (2013)
OK, hear me out on this one. Though not a love song in the traditional sense of the term, and the fact that it’s featured on easily the band’s worst album by far, ‘Why’d You Only Call Me When You’re High’ goes to show the full circle that Turner, perhaps as a romancer, perhaps as a songwriter, has come.
Now at the age of maturity, where growth has been earned, scars healed, remorse expressed, lessons learned etc., perhaps this song expresses the fact that all those prior relationships that Turner wrote of had all been dashed in favour of getting back to his roots, getting “fucked up with the boys”, having a good time, and seeing who’s about.
Ultimately, Alex Turner’s songwriting took us on a journey through the many facets of love’s defeats, conquests and triumphs, and while Tranquillity Base Hotel & Casino largely eschewed the familiarly trodden path of the love song in favour of exploring the themes of science-fiction, perhaps the forthcoming The Car LP will see Turner return what he does best: breaking hearts and mending them back together again.
