Arctic Monkeys speak about bassist

Arctic Monkeys have spoken about the motivation behind bassist Andy Nicholson's decision to leave the band.

Nicholson announced he no longer wanted to play with the British hitmakers just before their first US tour, but until now speculation has been rife as to what his reasons had been.

Clarifying the situation, frontman Alex Turner told NME: "We sorta found ourselves in a situations where we wanted to move forward. It weren't like us wanting to carry on like this as punishment for him wanting to opt out."

The band's guitarist Jamie Cooke continued: "Everyone might say we're w**kers and we sh** on him, but they don't know. We know, Andy knows and that's all that really matters."