The Last Shadow Puppets - The Age of the Understatement

Side-projects: for the artist who just can't fit his talent/ego within one band. So we have Jack White letting his inner Led Zep fanboy roam free in The Raconteurs, Nick Cave descending yet further into his own devilish psyche for Grinderman, Mark E Smith embracing German techno in Von Südenfed, and now Alex Turner leaving behind the grey streets of Sheffield for the decadence of '60s Vegas in The Last Shadow Puppets. Turner and Miles Kane, singer in Liverpudlian band The Rascals, met while on tour and decided to record an album of songs indebted to the faded glamour of '60s crooner Scott Walker. And so the result, The Age of the Understatement, sounds like nothing else you'll hear this year: epic, full-fat pop music, each song drenched in Goldfinger-style orchestration. Whatever the Arctic Monkeys fans make of it, Turner should be applauded for taking the risk of veering off in such an anachronistic direction. [Nick Mitchell]