GENNARO CASTALDO WATCH: Arctic Monkeys

It's been a nervous time for fans of HMV's Gennaro Castaldo - he's been quiet, unusually so. Now, though, he's popped up in an NME.com report on the Arctic Monkeys, although he's billed merely as "chart expert" (although it's in a paragraph straight after a reference to HMV, so we don't think he's quite gone freelance):

The album could sell up to 200,000 in its first week. Chart expert Gennaro Castaldo said: "We might be entering the Chinese Year of the dog, but as far as the Music Industry is concerned 2006 is very much the 'year of the monkey'. We haven't seen this level of excitement for a new artist since the Britpop-heralding arrival of Oasis more than 10 years ago.

"There has been a great vibe around the Arctic Monkeys for quite a few months now, but it usually takes much longer for a band to develop mainstream appeal and the commercial success that comes with it. The Arctic Monkeys seem to have managed this in just one leap - it's amazing how much impact they have had in such a short time."

We tip our hats to him for his "Year of the dog/year of the monkey" piece - perhaps he spent Christmas working that one up. Interestingly, although the Monkeys aren't selling anything like as fast as Oasis' Definitely Maybe did, the NME website still uses an Out Of Con-Text style headline (Arctic Monkeys set for 'fastest-selling debut rock album' - omitting the 'since Oasis' bit).

Still on the Arctic Monkeys' march to making the world sick of them before they'd released two singles, the 3am girls report on their covering a Girls Aloud song on Radio One yesterday (that's the first time a semi-credible northern British guitar band have ever covered a pop song by a female act during a live session on Jo Whiley's programme. Since Travis did Britney.) - for some reason, this has made them "cheeky" again. Now, we know they have "monkey" in their name, but does that really mean that we have to be told everything they do is "cheeky"? Can't the tabloids thing of any other simian-scented phrase to use?

Here's a list to help them:

Wise Monkey
Chunky Monkey
Hey, Hey, We're The Monke(y)s
Monkey See, Monkey Do
Monkey Magic
Butt Monkey
Monkey Smells of Gallagher

music gennaro castaldo arctic monkeys