Alex Turner

Alexander David Turner (born 6 January 1986) is an English singer and musician.

He is best known as the frontman and principal songwriter of the rock band Arctic Monkeys, with whom he has released seven studio albums.

In addition, he recorded his side project involving Miles Kane, as the Last Shadow Puppets and also as a solo artist.

When Turner was 15, he and three friends formed Arctic Monkeys in their native Sheffield.

Alexander David Turner was born in Sheffield on 6 January 1986, the only child of secondary school teachers Penny (née Druce) and David Turner.

He was raised in Sheffield's High Green suburb.

He has said that his parents came from "very different backgrounds"; his mother, from Amersham, Buckinghamshire, taught German and was "fascinated by language".

His father, a Sheffield native, taught music and physics.

Turner's parents were both music fans and his earliest musical memories involve the Beatles and The Beach Boys.

During car journeys, his mother played music by Led Zeppelin, David Bowie, and the Eagles.

His father was a fan of jazz and swing music, particularly Frank Sinatra, and had played the saxophone, trumpet, and piano in big bands.

Turner himself was taught some scales on the family keyboard by his father and took professional piano lessons until he was eight years old.

Pet Sounds was a big favourite when he grew up, it being the record that got Turner interested in music in the first place.

From the age of five, Turner grew up alongside neighbour Matt Helders; they attended primary school, secondary school, and college together.

At their primary school graduation ceremony, Turner and Helders joined some other friends in a mimed performance of Oasis' "Morning Glory"Helders played the role of Liam Gallagher while Turner pretended to play the bass guitar, using a tennis racket as his instrument.

The two met Andy Nicholson in secondary school, and the three friends bonded over their shared enjoyment of hip-hop artists such as Dr. Dre, the Wu-Tang Clan, Outkast, and Roots Manuva.

They spent their time playing basketball, skateboarding, riding BMXs, and "making crap hip-hop" beats using Turner's father's Cubase system.

Turner was educated at Stocksbridge High School from 1997 to 2002.

His former teacher, Mark Coleman, characterised him as a "bright" and "popular" student who excelled at sports rather than music.

His English and drama teacher, Simon Baker, remembered him as a clever pupil who was "quite reserved" and "a little bit different".

He noted that Turner had an "incredibly laid-back" approach to his studies, which worried his mother and led to criticism from other teachers.

While there were books at home, Turner did not read regularly and was too self-conscious to share his writing with others.

Nonetheless, he enjoyed English lessons.

Turner and his friends became interested in rock music following the breakthrough of the Strokes in 2001.

His father let him borrow a school guitar to learn a "couple of chords" when Turner was 15 and, for Christmas that year, his parents bought him an electric guitar.

Turner then attended Barnsley College from 2002 to 2004.

Given the opportunity to "get away without doing maths", he largely opted out of the "substantial" subjects required for university entry.

He studied for A-levels in music technology and media studies, as well as AS-levels in English, photography, and psychology.

At the age of 15, Turner's weekends revolved around girls and drinking cider with his friends.

Joe Carnall, a schoolfriend, has said Turner was "always the quiet one" in their social circle.

After friends began forming bands and playing live, Turner, Helders, and Nicholson decided to start Arctic Monkeys in mid-2002.

According to Nicholson, Turner already had "instruments about the house" and was conversant in the basics of musicianship because of his father's job as a music teacher.

Their debut album, Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not (2006), became the fastest-selling debut album in British history and was ranked at No. 30 on Rolling Stone list of the greatest debut albums of all time, with the single "I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor" becoming a UK number-one hit.

The band's subsequent studio albums, Favourite Worst Nightmare (2007), Humbug (2009), Suck It and See (2011), AM (2013), Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino (2018), and The Car (2022), have experimented with desert rock, indie pop, R&B, and lounge music.

Arctic Monkeys headlined Glastonbury Festival in 2007, 2013 and 2023, Reading and Leeds Festivals in 2009, 2014 and 2022, and performed during the 2012 London Summer Olympics opening ceremony.

As the co-frontmen of the Last Shadow Puppets, Turner and former frontman of The Rascals Miles Kane have released two orchestral pop albums: The Age of the Understatement (2008) and Everything You've Come to Expect (2016).

Turner also provided an acoustic soundtrack for the feature film Submarine (2010), and co-wrote and co-produced Alexandra Savior's debut album Belladonna of Sadness (2017).

Turner's lyricism, ranging from kitchen sink realism to surrealist wordplay, has been praised throughout the music industry and the public.

All but one of his nine studio albums have topped the UK Albums Chart.

He has won seven Brit Awards, an Ivor Novello Award, and a Mercury Prize, having been nominated six times for the latter.