The Last Shadow Puppets
is a project of Alex Turner of the band Arctic Monkeys, Miles Kane of the band The Rascals, and composer/producer James Ford.
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THE LAST SHADOW PUPPETS TICKETS
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History
Formation
In August 2007
NME
reported that
Arctic Monkeys lead singer
Alex Turner and lead singer of then newly formed
The Rascals,
Miles Kane would be recording an album with
James Ford producing and playing drums.
[1] Turner and Kane became friends when Kane's previous band
The Little Flames played support for Arctic Monkeys on their May/June 2005 UK tour. The Little Flames also supported Arctic Monkeys on their April 2007 UK tour, when Turner and Kane wrote songs together for a collaborative project.
[2] Their collaboration extended into Arctic Monkeys material, with Kane playing guitar on "505", the closing track of second Arctic Monkeys album
Favourite Worst Nightmare
and on "
Fluorescent Adolescent" b-sides "The Bakery" and "Plastic Tramp". Kane also guested on "505" and "Plastic Tramp" at several Arctic Monkeys gigs in 2007, including the summer mini-festivals at
Lancashire County Cricket Club and Arctic Monkeys' 2007 appearance at Glastonbury.
The initial recording of the album took place in France in late August 2007 with additional material added between August and December. In December
Owen Pallett was appointed to arrange the strings, brass and percussion for the album with the 22-piece
London Metropolitan Orchestra. During the recording of the album Turner and Kane hired a documentary film-making team, Luke Seomore and Joseph Bull, to capture the story of the project.
[3]
The Age of the Understatement
On 20 February 2008, the duo revealed they would be known as The Last Shadow Puppets and that their album would be titled
The Age of the Understatement
to be released on 21 April 2008. The album went straight to number one in the
UK Albums Chart. The first single, "
The Age of the Understatement" was released the week before on 14 April, with new song "Two Hearts in Two Weeks" and covers of
Billy Fury's "Wondrous Place" and
David Bowie's "In the Heat of the Morning" (a song previously mentioned by Turner as a favourite
[4]) as b-sides.
[5] The duo have said they took inspiration from
Scott Walker and early Bowie.
As well as this, there are also influences of The Beatles and late 60s/ early 70s progressive rock.
The second single, "
Standing Next to Me", was released on 7 July 2008.
[6] The album produced a third single, "
My Mistakes Were Made for You".
The album was nominated for the 2008
Mercury Music Prize [7] but lost out to
Elbow's The Seldom Seen Kid.
Second album
Kane has said in an interview with
The Sun that The Last Shadow Puppets will be looking to record new material in 2009.
[8]
Live appearances
The band played their first ever show in
Brooklyn,
New York at Sound Fix Records on 4 March 2008,
[9] playing a second gig at the
Lower East Side's Cake Shop the following night.
[10]
The Last Shadow Puppets played a short two song set on 5 April at the Lock Tavern in Camden, London. They played "Meeting Place" and "
Standing Next to Me" in support of
Remi Nicole, who organised the party both to celebrate her birthday and to raise money for
MS sufferers. The band have also performed on
Jools Holland's show
Later... with Jools Holland, with producer
James Ford on drums,
Stephen Fretwell on bass, John Ashton on keyboards and
Owen Pallett conducting the string accompaniment. The duo also played on
Friday Night with Jonathan Ross
on 5 July.
The band played a secret set at
Glastonbury on 28 June 2008 with Arctic Monkeys drummer
Matt Helders playing drums on "
The Age of the Understatement" and
Jack White of
The Raconteurs and
The White Stripes playing a guitar solo on "Wondrous Place".
[11]
On 4 July 2008, they performed
Standing Next to Me as part of a birthday present for
Jo Whiley on
BBC Radio 1. They also performed a cover of
Rihanna's
SOS.
The band and a 16 piece orchestra played two intimate live shows as warm up sessions for Reading and Leeds Festivals 2008, at
Portsmouth Guildhall and
Oxford New Theatre.
In October and November 2008, the band embarked on their first full headlining tour of the UK and US, which was generally well-received by both fans and critics.
[12] [13]
Awards and nominations
Year
| Award
| Category
| Nominated Work
| Result
|
2008
| MOJO Awards
| Breakthrough Artist
| Themselves
| Won
|
Mercury Prize
| The Age of the Understatement
| Shortlisted
|
Q Awards
| Best New Act
| Themselves
| Won
|
2009
| 2009 BRIT Awards
| British Breakthrough
| Nominated
|
They were nominated for Best Track 'The Age Of The Understatement', Best British Band and Best Video for 'My Mistakes Were Made For You' which they won at the Shockwaves NME Awards 2009.
Discography
Studio Albums
Year
| Details
| Peak chart positions
| Certificates
|
UK [14]
| AUS [15]
| AUT [16]
| CHE [17]
| CAN
| DEN [18]
| FLA [19]
| FRA [20]
| GER [21]
| IRE [22]
| NED [23]
| NOR [24]
| SWE [25]
| US [26]
| WAL [27]
|
2008
| The Age of the Understatement
- Released on 21 April 2008
- Labels: Domino
- Formats: LP, CD, digital download
| 1
| 30
| 60
| 47
| 65
| 23
| 4
| 18
| 42
| 2
| 12
| 23
| 34
| 111
| 39
|
|
Singles
Year
| Title
| Peak chart positions
| Album
|
UK
| EUR [28]
| FRA [29]
| IRE [30]
| NED [31]
| SPA [32]
|
2008
| "The Age of the Understatement"
| 9
| 26
| 81
| 34
| 97
| 3
| The Age of the Understatement
|
"Standing Next to Me"
| 30
| —
| 64
| —
| —
| 13
|
"My Mistakes Were Made for You"
| 81
| 87
| 64
| —
| 75
| —
|
References
- Arctic Monkeys front man to record surprise album this month
- Arctic Monkeys interviewed by Tom Doyle, Mojo, May 2007, p. 96
- Monkeys star making film about new album
- Random Rules:Alex Turner of Arctic Monkeys
- Alex Turner and Miles Kane cover David Bowie
- Standing Next to Me pre-order
- | Bearded magazine
- Rascal Miles Monkeys around
- Turner's Shadow Puppets play debut gig
- Alex Turner and Miles Kane play second New York gig
- Last Shadow Puppets and Jack White play secret Glastonbury gig
- Gig Review - Liverpool Daily Post
- Review - The Last Shadow Puppets - The Tart
- Title Unavailable
- Australian album positions
- Austrian album positions
- Swiss album positions
- Danish album positions
- Flemish album positions
- French album positions
- German album positions
- Irish ''The Age of the Understatement'' album position
- Dutch album positions
- Norwegian album positions
- Swedish album positions
- US album positions
- Wallonian album positions
- Billboard: European 100 positions
- Title Unavailable
- Title Unavailable
- Dutch single positions
- Spanish single positions