Arctic Monkeys: What music teacher said when band member returned to Barnsley College

But the lads from High Green have never forgotten their school and college days.

The band’s lead singer Alex Turner, drummer Matt Helders and guitarist Jamie Cook all went to Stocksbridge High before attending Barnsley College together to study for their A-levels between 2002 and 2004.

It was just one year after leaving Barnsley College that they topped the UK chart with the debut single I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor.

Turner had done A-levels in music technology and media studies, plus AS-levels in English, photography and psychology at Barnsley College.

Helders also took music technology and media studies, along with photography.

Speaking to host Yasi Salek on Spotify’s Bandsplain podcast, Helders recalled how he had taken music technology as he didn’t play an instrument at the time so he wasn’t allowed to do music.

He told how his best grade in media studies had been for analysing a grade in the 2001 action film The Fast and the Furious.

He failed photography, though he said he has ‘learned a lot more since’, adding ‘they weren’t interested in natural talent, they wanted me to show up and hand in work and stuff’.

He added: “I went back when our first single came out to see the music teacher. He said that it wasn’t mixed right. Even then he was like ‘I heard it on the radio, the backing vocals were a bit loud’.”

Despite that, Barnsley College is clearly proud of its former students, having shared a post in 2017 looking back at the band’s first gig at a Sheffield pub and commenting ‘and look where they are now!’.