10 Best Pop Albums Of 2018
1. Arctic Monkeys - Tranquillity Base Hotel & Casino
“Dancing in my underpants/I’m gonna run for government/I’m gonna form a covers band ‘nall!” promises Alex Turner on the second track of Arctic Monkeys’ latest album, Tranquillity Base Hotel & Casino. In a sense, that opening line is an encapsulation of the whole LP, not because of any direct lyrical connection to the other songs, but because it evokes a specific 2am, eight-pint drunken bluster where, for a fleeting moment, a person has the drive to be anything they put their mind to being. That same, delirious confidence defines every second of the Monkeys’ captivating sixth record.
While most fans were expecting a direct follow-up to AM, in true Arctics fashion “Tranquillity Base” is an affair with an entirely different sound. Not as a knee-jerk reaction to the 2013 album’s unfathomable success, but to explore preoccupations and ideas that have been bubbling under the surface of the band’s tracks for over 10 years now.
Consequently, the jump from desert rock to space-age lounge might not be as large as it first appears. In interviews, frontman Turner remarked how the lyrics of the latest record are as close as he’s ever come to replicating the style of the Monkeys’ seminal debut. At first, that might appear as a joke (or a slap in the face, depending on how you align with the band’s new direction) considering those 13 songs were stream-of-consciousness tales of drunken taxi rides home and pulling girls in clubs, while Tranquillity Base is more concerned with taquerias on the moon and virtual reality, but the comparison is spot on.
The content might have moved from Sheffield to Space, but there’s a sense of intimacy, honesty and imperfection to the lyrics that evokes the highest points of "Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not". It’s present in the disarming opening line of Star Treatment (“I just wanted to be one of The Strokes”) or the glorious self-deprecating breakdown on She Looks Like Fun (“I’m so full of s**te/I need to spend less time stood around in bars/Waffling on to strangers all about martial arts”).
These days it might be wrapped up in genre-bending lounge stylings or told from the fictional perspective of The Tranquillity Base receptionist, Mark, but the drive to not be whatever people say the Arctic Monkeys are is still present, nestled right alongside the most inventive, dense pop hooks you’ll find all year.