Alex Turner

Alex Turner

Alexander David Turner (born 6 January 1986) is a British musician and member of Arctic Monkeys and The Last Shadow Puppets. He is the vocalist and lead guitarist in both bands. He is the main songwriter in the Arctic Monkeys and shares writing duties in The Last Shadow Puppets with Miles Kane.

Forming Arctic Monkeys

Along with Andy Nicholson and Matt Helders, Turner attended Stocksbridge High School, and together with his neighbour Jamie Cook, formed Arctic Monkeys in 2002. From his time working at the bar in local concert venues, Turner was "really annoyed [by] bands coming on and saying 'We've got CDs at the back for sale - three pounds each'... you'd think 'Fuck off, who do you think you are?'". On this basis, Arctic Monkeys gave away free demo CDs at their gigs. Turner is believed to have started learning guitar because of the band that was one of his main influences, Oasis. Turner has always been the band's main songwriter, and his observations of inner city England have drawn comparisons to The Streets' frontman Mike Skinner. However, Turner has admitted that during the early days of the band "nobody wanted to admit they wrote [the lyrics] so we kept trying other singers so they'd do it for us." Despite enjoying songwriting, Turner shied away from acknowledgment because he "didn't want to have piss took out of [him]!" However, he has suggested that he has always enjoyed songwriting and that since getting his guitar, has spent most of his spare moments penning new lyrics, as "that’s what [he]'d feel comfortable doing. Describing the manner in which he constructs his lyrics, Turner says

"I'll think about something and I'll be writing, penning something down and I'll keep building on that. The best stuff comes when I’ve got a melody and a rhythm so I know how many syllables each line is going to have and then build it up from there, and make it a whole thing, and try and pay attention to every aspect."

The Last Shadow Puppets

In August 2007 plans were announced for Turner to record an album with friend Miles Kane and producer James Ford. Kane, of Arctic Monkeys support act The Rascals, announced the project on 2 August 2007. The project features Turner and Kane sharing vocal, guitar and bass duties with Ford playing drums. Owen Pallett also features on the album. The duo have called themselves The Last Shadow Puppets, the album is called The Age of the Understatement, and was released on the 21 April 2008 and reached the number one spot in its first week. They recently did a small tour backed by the London Philharmonic Orchestra, starting at Portsmouth Guildhall on 19 August 2008.

Other projects

Turner worked with Dizzee Rascal on the song "Temptation" from Dizzee Rascal's album Maths and English. He also worked with Dizzee Rascal on a different version of the same song "Temptation Greets You Like Your Naughty Friend" which featured on the "Brianstorm" single. Turner also features in the Reverend and the Makers song "The Machine" and features on guitar in the song "The Machine" from their debut album The State Of Things, on which he also co-wrote some of the songs with McClure. NME reported that Turner was working with Alison Mosshart of The Kills. Arctic Monkeys have gone to California to record some songs for their new album with Josh Homme of Queens of the Stone Age. He appears on Tony Christie's album Made in Sheffield, playing "The Only Ones Who Know". In October 2008, Turner made his debut as a short story writer, performing spoken word track "A Choice of Three" on his bandmates' compilation Late Night Tales: Matt Helders.

Equipment

Turner used to play a Fender Arctic White American standard Stratocaster, and later a black Mexican standard Fender Stratocaster guitar, both sporting maple fretboards, until the release of the band's single "Brianstorm" and the second album Favourite Worst Nightmare. When touring the new album he uses a black Fender Bronco with a black pickguard and rosewood fretboard, a guitar discontinued by Fender. Also, during live performances of "If You Were There, Beware", he uses a Gretsch Spectra Sonic baritone. During the earlier days he used Orange AD30T amplifiers. Now he uses a Fender Vibroverb for clean tones and a Selmer Zodiac 30 watt for more distorted tones. During the Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not-era Turner's pedalboard consisted of two Pro Co Rat 2 distortion pedals,Boss TU-2 tuner and a Danelectro Reel Echo. Now, touring Favourite Worst Nightmare, he has replaced the ProCo pedals with an Ibanez Ts-808 Vintage Tubescreamer overdrive pedal. He has also extended the pedalboard with a Hughes & Kettner Rotosphere MK2 and a Boss LS-2 Line Selector to go between his Selmer and Fender. There is also a Ibanez Ts-808 by Matt's drumkit where the distorted microphone is for "If You Were There, Beware". Turner was recently spotted with a sunburst finish Fender Jazzmaster, and it seems that instead of using the Fender Vibroverb and the Selmer Zodiac 30, Turner is only using the Selmer. Turner also changed around his pedal board a little bit, getting rid of his Danelectro reel echo and his Hughes & Kettner Rotosphere MK2 and replacing them with a Boss DM-1, and a Dunlop Uni-Vibe

Private life

Turner has maintained a very private life, and shunned media publicity when declared the Coolest Man On The Planet by NME magazine in December 2005. He supports Sheffield Wednesday. Blender magazine has described him as "the least talkative member of the group, chewing over his answers for so long that he ends up doubting his own words".

Previous to recording 'Favourite Worst Nightmare', Alex dated Johanna Bennett, with whom he co-wrote 'Fluorescent Adolescent'. She was a member of band Totalizer (now defunct) and current girlfriend of Matthew Followill, guitarist in Kings of Leon.

Alex has been dating the television presenter Alexa Chung since October 2007. In October 2008 they split when Turner left Chung for cake shop owner Clare Gordon which was widely frowned upon as she is a vampire.