Hear Me Out: Arctic Monkeys are the most pivotal rock band of the century
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Matt Helders (Credit Alamy)
The musician that made Arctic Monkeys’ Matt Helders learn to play the drums
Matt Helders is the not-so-secret weapon of Arctic Monkeys, who keeps the band ticking over, and everything in check. He’s one of the most revered drummers of his generation, and although Helders is only in his mid-30s, his place in this history books is already secured.
Over the last two decades, since Arctic Monkeys made their loud arrival with their debut album, Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not, they’ve asserted themselves at the top of the food chain, and no group has come close to knocking them off their perch. There are various reasons why they’ve become the band of their generation, and Helders’ balance of tenacity and precision is high on the list.
Helders didn’t set out to become a drummer, and his desire to be in a band made him learn the instrument because it “was the only thing left.” He continued, “When we started the band none of us played anything. We just put it together. They all had guitars and I bought a drum kit after a bit.”
After picking up the drums, Helders began studying the greats who had come before him. He idolised Led Zeppelin’s John Bonham, who he called his favourite drummer of all time, and looked up to Keith Moon, but Buddy Rich is responsible for convincing Helders that this is what he wanted to do with his life.
Speaking to Music Radar in 2013, Helders explained: “Buddy Rich had his band, Max Roach had his band, and they panned one to the left and one to the right. They did it like a kind of battle in the studio and recorded it in stereo. When you listen to it on headphones, Buddy Rich’s band is in your left ear and Max’s band is in your right.
“They play the various big band songs that Buddy Rich would normally do, but there’s always a little drum battle going on; some of the musicians take solos and stuff. It’s pretty interesting to follow everything from the left to the right. The fact that somebody would think to make a record like this is really impressive.”
Helders then spoke about Rich’s seismic impact on him as an impressionable young drummer and how it blew his mind when he first “stumbled across” footage of him performing.
The Arctic Monkeys man continued: “I’m a massive Buddy Rich fan. He’s probably the first drummer who, when I first saw him, made me say, ‘That’s what I want to do.’ Which is weird, because I don’t play anything like that – jazz and swing and big band. I stumbled across him playing on TV, and I’d never seen anything like what he was doing.”
While his influence on Helders is difficult to notice stylistically, as a rookie who was learning the instrument, the Arctic Monkey was mindblown after seeing the video of Buddy Rich performing, which was beyond what he thought was possible to achieve with a drumkit.
