Why Arctic Monkeys frontman Alex Turner won't go solo...

6 January 2020, 16:56 | Updated: 7 January 2020, 15:10

We celebrate the Arctic Monkeys frontman's 34th birthday by considering if he'll ever go it alone.

Alex Turner has turned 34 years old this Monday (6 January), but he's already experienced more than many of us will in our entire lifetime.

The Arctic Monkeys frontman has headlined festivals all over the world, won multiple awards and even kicked off his career with a Mercury Award.

However, the Sheffield rocker is yet to go solo. Will he ever do it? Let's examine the evidence below...

Will Alex Turner ever go solo?

Turner did of course create his own music for the Submarine soundtrack.

The 2010 film, which was written and directed by Richard Ayoade featured original songs from the Arctic Monkeys frontman.

Despite his tracks being released as an EP on 14 February 2011, its Piledriver Waltz track was later re-recorded for Arctic Monkeys' Suck It and See album.

Alex Turner has never released a full solo release and embarked on an accompanying tour.

ALEX TURNER ―‬ SUBMARINE [EP] (2011)

Back in 2018, it was reported that the frontman was considering taking the tracks he penned for the band's Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino album for himself before pushing ahead with the rest of the band.

However, he soon silenced those rumours by saying he never intended to go solo, as he feels that would be "disrespecting" his band mates.

Speaking to German outlet Intro, the R U Mine rocker said: "I was never interested in making a solo album. I am a part of this band and one would disrespect the other.

"Nevertheless, I wanted to make this music, it was in me. When you compose on the piano, you automatically get different results than on the guitar. And it was important to me to say goodbye to the realism of most of the Arctic Monkeys stuff. "

He added: "Overall, it developed in a direction that soon made me realise she had absolutely nothing to do with what people would expect from a Monkeys record."

Well, that seems to make sense.

After all, Turner can blow off plenty of steam in his duo The Last Shadow Puppets, in which he features with Miles Kane.

Watch Turner join Kane in Paris last year.

The pair last released a record in 2016, with Everything You've Come To Expect, which included singles in Bad Habits, and Miracle Aligner and the album's title track.

It's hard to say whether we'll get an Arctic Monkeys album or a Last Shadow Puppets album next, but right now both look more likely than an Alex Turner debut.

Listen to Alex Turner talk about Tranquility Base Hotel and Casino in our special track by track: