Arctic Monkeys’ Matt Helders – The Song That Changed My Life

The D4 – ‘6twenty’

My first relationship with vinyl was DJ-ing UK garage and shit like that when I was about 14. This is before I’d even thought about being in a band, so my affiliation then was just DJ-ing with these singles [Alex Turner interrupts: ‘I know for a fact Helders had ‘21 Seconds’ by So Solid Crew on wax! He was sampling the B-side of it, probably…’].

But because I had a record player I then got into having records. I’d get them off my granddad first – Frank Sinatra, Motown, and then The Carpenters and Beach Boys off my mum and dad. I was looking for things to sample and make into these stupid songs! The thing is though, that’s what made me interested in vinyl.

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I reckon I’d pick The D4’s album ‘6twenty’ as the record that changed my life. I know it wasn’t massive, but it was important for me. It came out when I was just learning the drums, and I remember they played a free gig at the Sheffield Leadmill, which we all went to. It was a big deal for us, something like that.

So I remember buying it in Barnsley HMV. It was before anyone had an iPod, and for some reason a lot of our mates got into that particular record. All of our mates, it seemed like, and all our band too, in fact. We still play it now, actually…

This article originally appeared in the April 21 issue of NME

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