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Arctic Monkeys heat up Boston

Maxwell Shultz
Connector Contributor

On Sept 6, the British pop-punk band, the Arctic Monkey’s fifth album, “AM” was released in the United States after a few year’s wait. Prior to release, the album had a few singles, such as “R U Mine?” and “Do I Wanna Know?” Upcoming, a fifth single will be released from this record, “Arabella.” This album has surpassed Daft Punk’s new album for fastest amount of copies sold copies in 2013.

Alongside the new album, the Arctic Monkeys have been on a world tour to support the album since a few months before its release. On Thursday, Feb. 6, they played in Boston at Boston University’s Agganis arena. I was fortunate enough to attend this concert, which also had two opening bands: The Orwells and Deerhunter. Both were enjoyable bands, for the most part.

The Orwells were a pop-punk band that sounded similar to the Arctic Monkeys, but had the stage presence of a 1969 Led Zeppelin. They played a short set and the singer was all over the place, even trying to jump into the crowd. After their impressive performance, Deerhunter took the stage. They were much less enjoyable, and even bad at performing at times. This group was partially electronic music, but they were also a full band. Watching them perform was a trippy experience for everyone involved; their voices were inaudible and their music was very abnormal.

Finally, after much anticipation, the Arctic Monkeys appeared on stage. They opened with the first track off their new album, “Do I Wanna Know?” and continued to play a set that was roughly twenty songs long, nearly an hour and a half show. Their opening song led on an entire setlist that was very bass guitar heavy and throughout they sounded flawless.

To pick out a few notable points in the show, mid-way through their set list, they performed a B-Side song, “Evil Twin,” off their fourth album. This is much lesser known, but fit right into the set. The band also performed a very bassy version of their song “Dancing Shoes,” off their first album which very literally got the whole audience on their feet and dancing. Finally, their closing song was “505” and they invited Miles Kane to perform it with them. The song overall was incredible live, but Kane was a great addition, as he rarely leaves Europe with the band.

After “505” and about twenty minutes of applause, the band returned with a three-song encore. It opened with a semi-acoustic version of “Cornerstone;” their song about trying to find a lost lover. The other two songs were singles off their new album which complemented each other magnificently. Lead singer Alex Turner’s parting words to Boston were, “Boston, are you mine?” This broke into the song, “R U Mine?” Overall, about half the show was new material and the other half was evenly distributed throughout their first four albums. This was a show to remember, and a band I would highly recommend seeing live or getting into.