Arctic Monkeys Sheffield: The chip shops where you may see Arctic Monkeys drummer Matt Helders

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Ahead of two giant homecoming gigs in Sheffield this week, Arctic Monkeys drummer Matt Helders took time out of his hectic schedule to discuss how he keeps grounded.

Oh, and he revealed his favourite chip shops in the city too!

He may have swapped High Green for L.A but he remains Sheffield through and through.

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Despite the somewhat obsessive interest that goes along with fame, it’s very apparent that there remains a desire to stay connected to his home city.

Arctic Monkeys drummer Matt Helders may well be spotted at these chip shops this weekArctic Monkeys drummer Matt Helders may well be spotted at these chip shops this week
Arctic Monkeys drummer Matt Helders may well be spotted at these chip shops this week

After relocating to Los Angeles, you could be forgiven for thinking that he was done with his hometown, so why bother coming back, a cynic might say.

But, it’s safe to say it’s not a sentiment shared by Matt, who was even keen to share his favourite chippy as testament to his fondness for coming home.

“I would say Two Steps on Sharrow Vale Road, my dad used to go there in his twenties. Obviously we lived in High Green, so we didn’t go that much but I lived in Sharrow Vale before I moved to L.A. and I could just walk down, so the Two Steps is the one for me,” he revealed.

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“Now if you’re in High Green, we always used to go to the Circle Friery which was just good because it was there.”

Matt and bandmates Alex Turner, Jamie Cook and Nick O'Malley are to perform at Hillsborough Park on Friday and Saturday to sell-out crowds.

Formed in 2002, the band played their first gig at The Grapes on Trippet Lane in Sheffield city centre on June 13, 2003. Their upcoming gigs in S6, just down the road from where they grew up – marks 20 years since that performance when they were just 16 years old.

When asked what keeps the Steel City lad grounded, he said: “A lot of that is down to the fact that we did know each other before it all, we’ve got a lot more in common than this band. There’s more for us to talk about than what the gig was like or what the record was like.

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“We can quite easily switch off and just hang around with each other. Plus we’ve got mutual friends so we can talk about them and experience that.

“It’s just that not everything is about the band, so I think that helps.”

With all the noise and hubris that comes with notions of fame, the band has a close group of people around them.

“There’s a real sense of being in it together, and that’s quite important with all of that,” he added.

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“You’d feel quite lonely if you were dealing with that on your own. I always think about people who are just singers without a band around them. That must be quite difficult.

“I tend to get snapped more than any of us, but at least I’ve got ‘us’ as well. And we’re always like, ‘yeah, this is mad’, everything that’s happened to us. We kind of like acknowledge it.”

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