The Cribs

With their stunning new IGNORE THE IGNORANT, THE CRIBS stake a legitimate claim as one of the premier bands of the decade. The follow-up to the band’s previous high water mark, 2007’s third album (and Warner Bros. debut), MEN’S NEEDS, WOMEN’S NEEDS, WHATEVER, the album sees the original fraternal trio – twins Ryan and Gary Jarman on guitar, bass and vocals, younger brother Ross on drums – lighting out for heretofore unexplored sonic territory, augmented by a new, previously unknown “brother” in the one and only Johnny Marr.  The legendary guitarist’s trademark sound is integrated seamlessly into the characteristic Cribs combination of perfect pop and punk power, bringing both nuance and dynamic strength to songs like “Cheat On Me” and “We Share The Same Skies.”  IGNORE THE IGNORANT stands as The Cribs’ most confident work to date, an audacious and daring collection marked by its widescreen sonic scope and high-definition clarity of vision.

Since day one, The Cribs have immersed themselves in forward-thinking indie-rock, just as their peers turned backwards towards Britpop.  Their proudly punk aesthetic – exemplified by a seemingly endless supply of shout-along hooks and choruses and famously frenzied live sets (spanning sold out headline tours, a US arena tour alongside Death Cab For Cutie and Franz Ferdinand, and countless festivals around the globe, including our own Coachella and Lollapalooza) – soon earned them a fervent fan following and the freedom to follow their artistic ambitions wherever they might lead. It seemed to make perfect sense that The Cribs said yes when invited to play Brixton with reunited Sex Pistols a couple years back just for their own pure fun of it.

The Wakefield-born trio has now spread out across the planet, with only Ross remaining in their Yorkshire hometown.  Ryan currently resides in London, while Gary lives 5,000 miles away in Portland.  It was there that he was first introduced to Marr, a part-time PDX resident since joining Modest Mouse in 2005.  Without question one of the most important and influential players in rock history, the Manchester-born guitarist – co-founder of The Smiths, member of The The, Modest Mouse, and Electronic, featured player on classic albums from Talking Heads, Beck, Pet Shop Boys, and countless others – stunned Gary with an admission of genuine admiration.

“He told me he was a fan of The Cribs,” Gary recalls.  “It sounds arrogant, but it was the first thing he said to me.  He told me how much he liked the band and it was so flattering.”

“I was so blown away by their second record,” Marr says.  “It felt like a place that I knew intimately well.  I heard that sound and it reminded me of what I feel when I stand in front of an amplifier.  There was something very familiar to me about it, like I knew them as individuals and I knew what made these individuals tick.  Amazingly, that turned out to be true.”

Gary introduced Ryan and Ross to the guitarist on the side of the stage at Glastonbury when both The Cribs and Modest Mouse played the festival in 2007. A few months later, Ryan bounded over to Marr at the annual Q Awards and informed the guitarist that they should make a record together.

“I thought it was a really good idea,” Marr remembers.

“Ryan texted us that night,” Ross recalls, “’Johnny’s up for writing songs.’ I was like, nice one.”

They united at Manchester’s Moolah Rouge Studios in January and immediately began writing together, beginning with the album-opening “We Were Aborted.”  Marr tagged along as The Cribs headlined the NME Awards Tour ‘08, joining them onstage each night for significantly longer than the previous gig.  By the time The Cribs headlined the annual Reading & Leeds Festival in August, Marr was officially part of the band.

“We’ve always been a three piece,” Ross says, “never thinking we needed a fourth member.  But now that we’ve got another guitar player, it feels exciting to us, like when we first formed the band.”

“It was a natural progression, really,” Gary says.  “He was a friend of ours, he’s a great guitarist, we like all the same music.  It just seemed like that’s what you do when you find someone who you feel is on the same page as you.  We were really happy that he wanted to do it.”

“Johnny just made our band better,” Ryan says succinctly.  “So that’s why he got to be in the band.”

Further songwriting sessions followed at a remote barn in Oregon City as well as Marr’s own Clear Studio in Manchester.  To make the album proper, The Cribs decamped to Seedy Underbelly studios in the sunny San Fernando Valley to work with legendary producer Nick Launay (Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, Public Image Ltd, Yeah Yeah Yeahs).

“That was a real pleasure,” Marr says.  “Nick still believes in the album as a collection of songs of where the band are at, as a statement of intent, as a chapter, not just a bunch of separate songs to be mixed as hot as possible and then shuffled on an iPod.  He always puts the music and the ideology of the band first.”

“He’s got a really good balance between keeping stuff live and raw,” Ryan says, “and also making songs sound atmospheric at the same time.”

The Cribs spent six weeks at Seedy Underbelly, tracking the album quickly and then taking the time to on mixing it just so.  The band exhibited unprecedented discipline while making the album, putting all of their considerable focus on the business at hand.

“When you’re in L.A., there’s a lot going on,” Ross says.  “But some of that stuff, like expensive parties, it’s not really us.  It’s not something we have any particular interest in doing.  So we were able to knuckle down because it’s just not so much our scene.”

“We really got involved on it,” Ryan says.  “We didn’t care about anything else. We just stayed in and worked on the record all the time.”

The band’s concerted efforts ring loud and true throughout IGNORE THE IGNORANT. “Cheat On Me” and “Hari Kari” are classic Cribs, all massive melodies and anthemic alienation, only now with more flavor and spark and scope.  The title track sees Marr’s Rickenbacker ringing out a riff instantly redolent of the guitarist’s illustrious past, while songs like “Save Your Secrets” and “Stick To Yr Guns” reveal a more introspective side to the Jarmans’ songwriting, adding pathos and poignancy to their mordant polemic power.

“I’m really proud of the two of them, the way they get on with the lyrics,” Marr says.  “They really don’t make a fuss about it but they put a hell of a lot of work into it. They come up with the goods and they spend a lot of time and energy doing it.”

“We don’t feel like we’ve got anything to prove anymore,” Gary adds.  “We can write about whatever we want and be as honest as we want and that’s a good thing.”

That same spirit of pushing the envelope applies as much to the music as the lyrics.  The epic “City of Bugs” sees the Cribs continuing to mine a challenging musical path first begun on their previous album’s provocative, droning “Be Safe.”

“We wanted to make something a little more sprawling and atmospheric,” says Ryan, “but still with kind of punk elements to it.  To me, it embodies all the things we’ve been wanting to do recently.  It feels like exactly where we’ve been heading.  It feels like we hit the nail on the head with regards to what we were trying to do.”

“The Cribs used to always rely on energy and power,” Gary says.  “We used to thrive on that.  But this time we definitely wanted to embrace the gentler, more expressive side of things.”

Publicity // Rick Gershon at Warner Music Group // Rick.Gershon@wbr.com

Booking // Matt Hickey at High Road Touring // matt@highroadtouring.com

Subscribe: RSS | iCal