The Cribs – Moving Pictures

Release date: Out now

Format: Single
Genre: Indie/Pop-Punk
Our rating: 4/5

Moving Pictures has a certain sensibility about it, but a punky flamboyance in contrast. Images of sweaty bodies and smiling faces all singing along to the infectious chorus and jumping around to the fabulous riffs are bound to be conjured up. This latest offering from the Cribs  brings in the lyrics and emotions of this jovial classic.

The Cribs keep up the good work with ‘Moving Pictures’, and fans of The Kooks, Razorlight, The Rakes and The Editors are bound to be putting this at the top of their shopping list this summer.

Review by Karolyn Judge

Press Release:
There can be little denying that in 2007, indie music IS pop music. If you follow your ears in virtually any direction across the UK, you’ll see/hear northern monkeys, southern libertines and a wide selection of Scottish scampsters all hitting the headlines for everything from making music to making toilet. All eras of cultural cross-breeding have their un-sung heroes and this modern age is no exception because The Cribs have definitely put in more than they’ve got out thus far. But four years, hundreds of gigs, thousands of fans and more than a few injuries on from their first ever release, they’re back to get what’s due… whatever that may be.

There’s no doubting that they now have the sonic ammunition to do exactly that but unlike some guitar-toting chancers seem to do, the twelve moments of blistering pop magic contained within their third album ‘Men’s Needs, Women’s Needs, Whatever’ weren’t just cobbled together backstage at the Dublin Castle last week. It’s a peak of ingenuity that the Jarman siblings- Gary (bass/vocals), Ross (drums) and Ryan (guitar/vocals)- have been edging towards since they first began making an adolescent racket back in Wakefield. Some years later, their recording careers were finally launched in earnest: the self-titled debut (2004) was the musical equivalent of a hyperactive pre-pubescent with a charmingly wide-eyed innocence, 2005’s ‘The New Fellas’ had the stature of an unruly-yet-highly creative teenager whilst ‘MNWNW’ is the vision of the young adult- smarter, wiser, cocksure and ready to take on the world.

The record took shape in the Canadian city of Vancouver during the late summer of 2006 where the brothers found the ideal person to help make them make the transition from indie-boys to rock ‘n’ roll men. “In a way I think we were lo-fi snobs in a way,” admits Ryan in retrospect. “We always wanted to make our records sound raw and live but working with Alex Kapranos made us understand how we could expand on that. He’s just as indie-minded but he showed us that we could still sound live even if we added extra instruments and gave the songs more depth. Alex taught us not to be ashamed about doing things like that and how reaching more people can never be a bad thing.”

But these are songs that are not simply going to reach people, they’re going to floor them. Whether it be the fizzing riffs and catchy refrains of ‘Men’s Needs’ and ‘My Life Flashed Before My Eyes’, the sneering punk ferocity of ‘Our Bovine Public’ and ‘Major’s Titling Victory’ or the touching tenderness of ‘I’ve Tried Everything’ and the gorgeous, lullaby-like closer ‘Shoot The Poets’, they are all the kind of songs that bore a hole into the head yet settle in very different parts of the brain. Furthermore, you can also hear how the Cribs are laying more sonic building blocks to help them scale future heights. The maniacal, mutated guitar freak-out at the end of ‘Woman’s Needs’ places a feral full-stop at the end of what might-otherwise be a smash hit (doesn’t matter, plenty more potential top ten tunes where that came from) and yes, that is Lee Ranaldo you can hear spitting bile behind ‘Be Safe’’s broodingly brilliant art-rock drones. Approached by the band partly because of his much praised spoken word work, the Sonic Youth man’s proactive contribution extended to adding extra harmonies and his enthusiasm for the track creates a vision of New York(Shire) as it should have been rather than it actually was. Not only is ‘Be Safe’ the most daring song on the album, it also contains the most anthemic chorus the band has ever done. And as anyone who has come across the Cribs before will know, that’s saying a hell of a lot.

If ‘Men’s Needs, Women’s Needs, Whatever’ ends up being the album that sends the Cribs into new realms of achievement then it won’t be a minute before time. The years that these three spent carving out a grassroots fanbase by playing toilets, sheds and backrooms in pubs with names like The Hound And Hooligan were done with the intention of one day getting some kind of return but some of the Jarman thunder was stolen while they had their backs turned. Amassing copious amounts of internet popularity and a number of MySpace friends that could populate a small Eastern European country is the easy part, getting them all to come to your gigs is much harder but the Cribs have been doing that for years - one “pro-vin-c-ial town” at a time. And now it’s time to reap what’s long been sowed.

www.myspace.com/thecribs 
www.thecribs.com


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MyVillage, 01st August