I discuss the collaboration between Arctic Monkey's frontman Alex Turner and Rascals songwriter Miles Kane with non-Mogger, the Girlfriend (a.k.a Jill).The GF: These songs really wants to make you want to jiggle your body and dance around. It’s sad though, if I like something, I can’t be jokey about it. I can’t slag it.Me: Okay, I’ll slag it.The GF: No, don’t!Me: This is the 21st Century…The GF: Don’t!Me: ….why this pastiche stuff?The GF: Stop! Shut it!Me: Oh dear, we’ve hit a nerve with this album!The GF: I like that kind of music!Me: Pastichey stuff?The GF: Stop! I think these songs are amazing, a fantastic album.Me: Yeah, but it’s the whole English thing of lets bring the 60s back. Amy Winehouse, Duffy… It’s been done.The GF: Aaaah, sharrruuup!Me: The Brits are obsessed with the 60s. Michael Caine films. “You were only supposed to blow the bloody doors off!” on and on forever. Noel Gallagher’s whole career is built on the 60s. And now [Alex] Turner’s going back to the 60s! Nicking music off Scott Walker!The GF: He’s not nicking it!Me: What’s he doing, then?The GF: He’s reinventing!Me: Oh, he’s reinventing, is he? Noel Gallagher nicks it, and Turner reinvents it. The GF: Yeah! He does! Because he’s a fantastic musician and lyricist who doesn’t have to nick stuff from anyone. He’s just writing in that genre. Okay? Him and his little friend there.Me: Miles.The GF: Miles Kane. I’ve had this album for about a week, and I’ve listened to it probably a hundred times. Me: So you’re biased.The GF: I’m biased. I have to say it’s an outstanding album.Me: He’s a bit of a show off, isn’t he? This and another Arctics one on the way. Doing three albums in one year.The GF: Secretly, I think he wrote them when he was younger, and is just bringing them out now.Me: So he’s a boy genius, as well?The GF: Yeah.Me: What’s he roping the other fella in for? Kane.The GF: He helps people along the way. Me: He did the album up himself and stuck Kane’s name on it. The GF: Yeah. Me: Okay. What’s it all about, this album? How can you take it seriously?The GF: What do you mean, take it seriously? It’s a beautiful album!Me: Art is supposed to prepare you for death, in the words of [film director] Andrei Tarkovsky. Does this album prepare you for death?The GF: It does!Me: How?The GF: I’d like to listen to that before I pop my lid!Me: A lot of people have, I’d say. Listened to that and popped off. I don’t know what he’s on about. The GF: Because maybe you’re not listening to him.Me: I get that he’s not writing about everyday life in Sheffield anymore, and I get that he’s very good with words, but I don’t know what the fuck he’s talking about. In any of the songs. Tell me, in your own words, what the fuck he’s singing about there [in My Mistakes Were Made For You]?The GF: He made mistakes. But at the end of the day they were for her. For the love of her. Me: What? Hold on! I come into the house, I go, “Sorry, love, I lost ten thousand euros on a horse but I, ehm, I did it to buy you a ring…so I lost it for you."The GF: It’s not the same!Me: What would you say to me?The GF: Pack your bags.Me: “Pack your bags.” Exactly. Turner comes in, and says my mistakes are made for you, and knickers are flying off, legs are going up into the air. And Miles is in the background watching. The GF: You, as a man, don’t understand women! And he does!Me: That’s the crucial point I’m missing? That’s why he’s so successful? Alex understands women, and the rest of us don’t?The GF: Yeah.Me: Another fucking reason to hate him. But how does he understand women? He’s a child!The GF: Because he’s sensitive. Like, in the Arctic Monkey’s song Despair In the Departure Lounge, he’s singing about going off on tour, and he's with his band, and he should be all excited, but he’s pining for this girl he’s in love with. And I don’t really think men think about those things.Me: So, a bloke heading off on tour is thinking about the person he’s leaving behind, rather than all the women he could be shagging on tour.The GF: Yeah.Me: That is unusual. Where are other males going wrong?The GF: I think they’re too egotistical and they’re thinking of themselves. Me: Okay, I think I understand now. I understand women.The GF: You do in your arse!
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