Arctic Monkeys On Independence

Sheffield indie giants Arctic Monkeys have revealed that they considered producing their new album 'Humbug' by themselves.

One of the most talked about albums of the year, 'Humbug' unites Britain with the United States. To record their third album Arctic Monkeys recruited Josh Homme, with the band heading to California to lay down the initial tracks.

With the release of the album almost upon us, anticipation is high. ClashMusic has already heard the album, which advances on Arctic Monkeys previous artistic highs without losing their ineffable magic.

However in a new interview lead singer Alex Turner reveals that the group considered producing the album by themselves. The frontman told Australian radio station Triple J that before Homme was recruited, the group considered going it alone.

"There was definitely a time when we were oh, we could do this album by ourselves" he confirmed.

"There were two routes. It was like either you can you know build a studio, go down that kind of path but I don't think we were quite ready for that. It seemed more exciting to go to Joshua Tree."

"The thing with Josh was an idea that we mentioned ages ago while we were still touring the second album. It started off like an experiment. Even if we didn't get any recordings out of it I thought it'd be a good move to go in with someone that you've not been in the studio with before or that's even themselves perhaps not used to that situation of producing outside his own band."

The songwriter also revealed that he had been challenged to change his musical approach in the run up to recording the album. "I'm kind of more comfortable writing now or even spending time sitting and working on something where I always kind of attached the idea that whatever magic was there would dissolve or evaporate if you spent too much time working on something."

"I think I'm over that idea. I quite like to sit and craft something now for a little bit longer."