Ok people, hold on tight to your seats because I have a fresh post about an amazing British band I just saw live!! Yesterday (30th October 2011) I went to see Arctic Monkeys’ gig at the O2 Arena in London!
The support group of this concert were The Vaccines, which are supporting the Monkeys also for the rest of their UK tour. They come from London and they are really good musicians, somehow their sound and the singer’s voice brings you back in time. Well, yesterday they were playing “at home” so I guess they felt comfortable enough on stage and they did great! They’re music style is a mixture of rock, rock n’ roll and indie. Their concert started around 7.45 pm and lasted until 8.20 pm, well I think it’s about the right length of time for a support act, even though the public wouldn’t have regret listening to some more songs. But everybody (including myself) was pretty excited about the headliners:
ARCTIC MONKEYS!!! I guess the four lads from Sheffield don’t need any presentation… They’re one of the most famous and successful British indie rock bands of the last few years. I won’t deny that they’re one of my favourite bands but I’ll try to be objective as much as I can where it’s needed. Arctic Monkeys played from 9 pm to 10.20 pm with a short break just before the last couple of songs. They kicked off their concert with “Don’t sit down ’cause I moved your chair” a song taken from their new album “Suck it and see”, with frontman Alex Turner mimicking the macarena. The witty and funny lyrics of this song bring you already into the right atmosphere and mood of an Arctic Monkeys concert: it’s all about having fun! After that they played a few more songs taken from “Suck it and see” and then went back in time playing some of their early ever green tunes such as “Fluorescent Adolescent” and “I Bet That You Look Good on The Dancefloor” which got the entire O2 Arena dancing and jumping around, even the people having the seats stood up and danced. Well actually they were standing from the beginning to the end of the concert, how can you avoid dancing at a rock concert? Moreover, when Alex Turner asks you to scream out loud you can’t do that if you are sat on a chair, can you? Also because the song “Don’t sit down cause I moved your chair” suggests you not to sit down 
So when everybody stands up suddenly the O2 Arena becomes a huge dancefloor or mosh pit or whatever you want to call it. When the Monkeys played their old songs you could feel that the public was more involved both in singing the tunes along and dancing, but maybe it’s just because the last album is a bit more quiet than the others and doesn’t allow you to do the same, at least not once you just superficially know it. Anyway, usually when you go to a concert you love to hear the old songs because they’re the ones you’re more familiar with because you’ve been listening to them for a long time. This doesn’t mean that the old songs are better than the new ones, it really depends on the tastes of each of us. Going back to the concert, Arctic Monkeys played some songs from each of their four albums, I really liked the mix between older songs and newer songs. It’s also nice to hear how they musically changed for example from a song such as “Dance little liar” which is quite dark to “The Hellcat Spangled Shalalala” which is a happy and catchy tune. During the concert, the singer Alex Turner was the only member of the band speaking, he told the different sections of the public when to scream and such things which kept the atmosphere nice and warm. The light games on the stage were remarkable, there were also some screen on both side of the stage where you could see the members of the band playing. One thing which I think was really amazing is when after the short break the band came out again and played an acoustic version of “Mardy Bum” and Alex let the public sing in parts of the song. It must be amazing for a singer to hear his same song given back to him by the public. Beside that, I loved the way they “changed” the song, somehow as to adapt it to the style of their last album. I was surprised because I had heard in an interview that they wouldn’t play “Mardy Bum” at concerts anymore, but luckily they didn’t stick to what they said! Another thing I love is the way Alex accentuates the pronunciation of consonants at the end of words while singing, you can notice it in the album version but I think that live it’s even more remarkable for example in a song such as “Pretty Visitors” and well also his voice in itself has something particular. Finally, they ended the concert with “505″ the usual song they use to close concerts, during that song an incredible game of lights was at work: orange, yellow and flashing white to end in style. Overall it was an amazing concert, I really loved it! Though I think it could have lasted a bit more since it was a big concert and not an open air where you really have to respect the schedule because of the other bands. But it was definitely worth it! I had already seen them at a festival this Summer and I’ll definitely go to see them again!!!
Here’s Arctic Monkeys’ setlist (not everything’s in order, I couldn’t remember the correct order):
Don’t Sit Down Cause I Moved Your Chair
Black Treacle
Suck it and See
I bet that you look good on the dancefloor
Still take you home
Brick by Brick
Do Me a Favour
Dance little liar
Crying Lightning
Pretty Visitors
Brianstorm
When the sun goes down
Fluorescent Adolescent
Evil Twin
She’s Thunderstorms
The View From the Afternoon
Teddy Picker
This house is a circus
Mardy Bum (acoustic)
505 (last song)
Here’s The Vaccines’ setlist:
All in White
Wetsuit
If You wanna
A lack of understanding
Under your thumb
Post break-up sex
Blow it up
Wrecking bar (ra ra ra)
Norgaard
The festival’s location was also particularly nice, being taking place in a park right by the lake!
