Review: Arctic Monkeys – The Car

The Car has the distinction of being the second-best Arctic Monkeys lounge album, and their most boring release to date.

 

When Arctic Monkeys released their sixth album Tranquility Base Hotel and Casino in 2018, I don’t think anyone expected it to be a science fiction-themed lounge album that barely qualified as rock. Even if you enjoyed the album (as I did), there was a sentiment of “they can’t pull something like this off again, can they?” Sure, Arctic Monkeys had their fun with this unconventional release, but it was time for them to get back to being a rock band again with their next effort.

If you were hoping for a “return to form” on Arctic Monkeys’ seventh album The Car, I have some bad news for you. The Car doubles down on their transformation into a lounge act, ditching the sci-fi theme and retro synthesizers of its predecessor for lush orchestration and nonsensical lyrics. Without these extra frills, The Car only manages to be the second-best Arctic Monkeys lounge album, and their most boring release to date.

To be fair, there are some nice things to say about The Car. Its three singles were all smart choices, and they are the strongest parts of the album. “There’d Better Be a Mirrorball” is an excellent way to introduce The Car, spinning a tale of heartbreak with lines like “So do you wanna walk me to the car? I’m sure to have a heavy heart.” After a minute of harpsichord and strings that sound like they’re straight out of a James Bond flick, the track settles into its gentle, cymbal-tapping drumming, undulating synthesizer, and singer Alex Turner crooning as he plays staccato piano notes.  The song’s melancholy theme comes to the fore during its second chorus, as the full orchestra appears to play Turner off in a dramatic fashion. Second track “I Ain’t Quite Where I Think I Am” immediately dispels the notion that this is solely a lounge album. It’s got with the funkiest guitar you’ve ever heard on an Arctic Monkeys release, coupled with bongos. “Body Paint” serves as The Car’s climax, a musical tour de force that keeps you guessing what it’ll do next. Opening with Turner singing in falsetto over piano, the track abruptly switches all instrumentation to violins about one-third in, before swapping this gentle accompaniment once again to power chords. The final third of the track is pure rock, electric guitar solo and all, and there’s nothing else quite like it on The Car.

Outside of these singles, The Car plays its hand quite early. Once the full orchestra comes in to boost the poignancy of “There’d Better Be a Mirrorball,” every subsequent appearance feels like an imitation subject to diminishing returns. From the title track to “Big Ideas” to “Mr Schwartz,” the album is full of absolutely gorgeous strings that oversaturate the album and render their dramatic effect useless by the time you get to the closing “Perfect Sense.” It also doesn’t help that we’ve heard Turner with an orchestra quite a bit before from his side project The Last Shadow Puppets. Similarly, while “I Ain’t Where I Think I Am” introduces The Car’s funkier side, it makes the later funk-inspired tracks “Jet Skis on the Moat” and “Hello You” less distinguishable. Interestingly, the one non-single that does stand apart is “Sculptures of Anything Goes,” an unexpectedly electronic track that’s mostly just Turner with a Moog synthesizer and a drum machine. This track, plus the three aforementioned singles, are all on the first half The Car, making it an extremely front-loaded album.

If you were turned off by the Arctic Monkeys’ dramatic change in sound on Tranquility Base Hotel and Casino, you at least had to admit its lyrical themes about a lunar resort were entertaining. There’s no denying that this novelty was a big draw for the album, and that novelty is something The Car lacks. Grounded back on Earth, it’s sometimes uncharacteristically earnest, with lines like “if you’re thinking of me I’m probably thinking of you” on “Body Paint.” Occasionally, it’s even self-referential, like the very on-the-nose lyric “puncturing your bubble of relatability with your horrible new sound” on “Sculptures of Anything Goes,” or the entirety of “Big Ideas.” However, most of the time it’s completely incomprehensible. “Jet Skis on the Moat” opens with “Jet Skis on the Moat, they shot it all in CinemaScope” and “Hello You” opens with “Lego Napoleon movie, written in noble gas glass-filled tubes.” “Sculptures of Anything Goes” contains the passing thought “the simulation cartridge for City Life ‘09 is pretty hard to come by” and the title track mentions “sweeping for bugs in some dusty apartment, the what’s-it-called cafe.” I’m sure these kinds of opaque lyrics will lead to hours of debate on genius.com about their deeper meanings, but will make most listeners just think “what the hell?” and miss Tranquility Base Hotel and Casino’s references to the Moon’s crater Clavius, or even simply tune out.

And tune out you will from time to time, since The Car is not really an engaging album. You have to listen to it very intently for it not to fade into the background. Turner is a decent vocalist, and his singing has come a long way from his distinctive Sheffield-accented days in the mid-2000s, but he punches a little over his weight on such a vocal-reliant effort. It’s not as much “The Alex Turner Show” that Tranquility Base Hotel and Casino was, but he’s still the dominant presence while Jamie Cook, Nick O’ Malley, and Matt Helders pop in and out. The Car is sure to invite comparisons to countless 70s musicians, but these pretentious conversations always seem to sidestep the question of “did you actually like it?” If there’s one saving grace for Arctic Monkeys’ path from here, it’s that Turner never likes to make the same thing twice.

Rating: 5.5/10