Arctic Monkeys

Add Date: June 7 

Artist: Arctic Monkeys 

Album: Suck It and See 

Label: Domino 

Genre: Rock 

Comments: First, it seems necessary to address the title of Arctic Monkeys' fourth studio LP. According to the band, it's not meant to be offensive; as frontman Alex Turner recently told The New York Times: "It's an old Britishism, like a bit Dick van Dyke-y, like 'give it a try' almost--it'd be a slogan for some candy. That's not really traveled well." He's certainly right on the latter count; according to NME, the album title is being censored by "some US supermarkets." Two things about that: first, Turner and his bandmates unquestionably knew that this would happen, regardless of their allegedly innocent intentions; secondly, if you get your music from a supermarket, your life isn't really going to be impacted by this bit of overreaction.

Now that that's out of the way, let's clear up something else: Arctic Monkeys are the best of their lot--more consistent than, say, The Strokes, and simply better and more interesting than Franz Ferdinand, Pete Doherty or any of the other British acts you might throw out for consideration. Turner is one of the top songwriters of his generation, and the band behind him--Jamie Cook on guitar, Nick O'Malley on bass and Matt Helders on percussion--is a seamless unit, equally capable of shredding through a powerful rock song as delivering a well-constructed pop number.

At some point, you would expect a letdown from the band, but Suck It and See isn't it; in four attempts, Arctic Monkeys have delivered four excellent LPs. As with 2009's Humbug, the new record displays a band that continues to mature, while still staying interesting and relevant--and let's not forget that, while they have a substantial American following, they're absolutely huge in the UK. And they continue to live up to the hype.

Spin tracks 5, 1, 12, 2 and 9.