Arctic Monkeys’ Alex Turner revisits his infamous BRIT Awards speech

Virgin Radio

2 Oct 2022, 11:04

"Invoice me for the microphone if you need to..."

Arctic Monkeys main man Alex Turner has commented on his legendary and much praised/mocked acceptance speech at the 2014 Brit Awards.

During the speech, Turner talked about “that rock’n’roll” and the “cyclical nature of the universe” while collecting the band’s award for MasterCard Album of the Year for AM at the ceremony.

Then then dropped the microphone and walked off stage.

Speaking to The Guardian, and asked whether the moment resembled a form of performance art that 'perhaps anticipated his scepticism towards the rock construct', Turner replied: “That’s interesting… so we’re saying it’s tied to [2013 album] AM, because of the haircut and … that performer …

“When you think about that, and the clothes, I wasn’t doing that with [fourth album] Suck It And See or [third] Humbug. It wasn’t grease in the hair,” he said.

“Normally, the record you make encourages a certain style of performance. But thinking about the performer in relation to Tranquility [Base Hotel & Casino], or even [upcoming album The Car], I have considered that you can invert that. The performer can influence the music, rather than the other way around.”

The frontman previously addressed the speech in 2018, telling Mojo magazine, “I maintain that I didn’t really have another way around it. Another way of justifying getting up in that room. What else was I supposed to do? To go up there and pretend that I’d been dreaming about that moment since I was a kid would have been dishonest.”

Arctic Monkeys recently dropped their second single from The Car, a song called 'Body Paint'. That new record is due to arrive on October 21st.

Not long to wait now!