Arctic Monkeys in Dublin review: Alex Turner and co kick hard at triumphant 3Arena gig
Arctic Monkeys played at 3Arena in Dublin on Sunday night. (File picture: AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)
When Arctic Monkeys cancelled their Marlay Park gig last June, a week before Glastonbury due to “medical advice”, something smelled a bit off. Depending on how you feel about their change of direction with 2018’s Tranquillity Base Hotel & Casino and 2022’s The Car (possibly their best album), their Worthy Farm set was either a moody triumph or a self-indulgent misstep.
Those in the latter camp may have been fortunate the band skipped Rathfarnham because, while the setlist wasn’t all that different on Sunday night in 3Arena, from their festival one, it kicked a lot harder.
‘Brianstorm’ and ‘Teddy Picker’, the one-two punch that opens second album Favourite Worst Nightmare, were early ferocious, melee-inducing explosions. Matt Helders attacked his kit like a starving animal let loose in a butcher’s shop. Alex Turner looking impossibly cool in blazer, open-necked shirt and 1970s sunglasses, like a Yorkshire Elvis taking fashion advice from Nick Cave, singing and strangling his guitar at the same time.
A fantastic ‘Don’t Sit Down ‘Cause I’ve Moved You Chair’ had a malevolent, snaky groove, as did an equally great ‘Why’d you Only Call Me When You’re High?’ and ‘Arabella’ evoked shades of Black Sabbath’s ‘Iron Man’ only with a much better melody. They sounded like tepid ballads, however, compared to the maelstrom of guitar and drums that was a stand-shaking ‘The View From The Afternoon’.
Not forgetting the album they’re touring, ‘There’d Better Be A Mirrorball’ was Scott Walker produced by slightly-inebriated John Barry, ‘Body Paint’ a widescreen epic with Turner blowing kisses and milking applause before a gargantuan Mick Ronson chord finish, and when he sat at the keyboard during ‘Hello You’, the light hit the mirror ball over his head and bathed the room in a butterfly swarm of light. His baritone voice was particularly strong as he gesticulated through a grandiose ‘Tranquillity Base’.
‘Snap Out Of It’, ‘Fluorescent Adolescent’, ‘Do I Wanna Know?’ and an encore ‘I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor’ were all balls tapped into open goals that had a crazed, packed arena convulsing like they’d been connected to the mains.
‘505’, reupholstered with the help of a five-piece string section and two keyboard players, combined where the Monkeys were with where they’re at now.
Some may have wished for more cuts from The Car but complaints would be churlish after witnessing maybe the last great rock band give the people what they want and do their own thing at the same time. Marvellous.
