In the run up to the 2015 NME Awards, Replay present a night in Camden with The Cribs. 

 

Rock institution – The NME Awards – are back again for 2015 and of course, the pre-shows are just as captivating as the main event.

Returning after a two year hiatus to the gig scene, The Cribs were back with new material and a host of new fans ahead of the release of their new album For All My Sisters charted for release this March. Of course, there’s one thing every indie or rock boy band need more than a crowd of screaming teen girls and leather-clad guys; and that’s a stellar pair of skinny jeans. With that in mind, it was only fitting that denim connoisseurs Replay were our hosts for the night. Whilst first-gen Cribs kids (us included) danced alongside a new wave of fans, we were treated to The Cribs new track “Burning For No One” at heart palpitating volume. Of course, first-time-round classics also permeated the venue at Camden Electric, with “Hey Scenesters” and “Mirror Kisses” firm favourites all round. Wonderland chats Ryan Jarman after the gig…

 

So, how was last night for you?

It was fun, we had a good time and it was nice to play a headline show. It’s been a while since we’ve done that and I forget how fun that is. It was a great result.

You pulled in a really diverse crowd, there were loads of really young people who are obviously still finding your music…

Yeah, a few people have said that to me and it’s one of the coolest things – the fact that we have an young audience when we’ve been going for a while. The fear is that the audience grows with you, and that I’m really proud of, but we have an injection of new younger fans which is good because otherwise you become those people who are preaching to the converted.

Yeah people were little kids dancing around to “Mirror Kisses” and “Hey Scenesters”. They were going wild for it.

And to think that came out ten years ago and they were like 9 years old.

Exactly. So do you feel the NME Award Shows have changed over the years? 

We’ve done a few before I think, I remember the first one we did was with, Giant Drag that was really cool. It was 2007, I was going to say that there were more bands then, but it’s the same as last night really. It was cool being with ?, a brand new band. We’ve done a million NME awards gigs to be honest.

Do you think that between 2008 and now they have become a bit more sterilised?

I think people are always pretty much exactly the same. I think in some ways we’ve been really lucky, because we’ve been pretty much unaffected by the fluctuating trends through the years but our gigs have stayed the same.

Your new track, “Burning for No One”, went down really well!

Yeah that was cool because you always get kind of nervous putting new stuff out, you always expect it to be a little bit less well received because it’s unfamiliar, but we were happy with how all the new stuff when down. It’s nice when that energy gets transported back.

What about the lyrics for “Burning For No One”, what’s it about?

We never put too fine a point on stuff, its always just about trying to evoke a feeling. But for me, with that song, there are a few things that strike the heart about situations from when I was younger. I could never really secure it before, but now the situation is that I’ve been writing songs for a long time about feelings that I had before, that’s kind of like what that one’s about.

What else can we expect from For All My Sisters?

Well “Burning For No One” and “Ivory Hand” are pretty good records, then there are a couple of pop-y songs. Everything is just more concise and stripped back, we tried to streamline everything. I think that the new record is like that.

What we’ve heard so far sounds great. How do you think the rock industry is like looking right now, in a scene that’s quite saturated with grime and dance?

Yeah well that’s the way that things always go, the pendulum always swing from one extreme to the other. We were expecting it because obviously by 2007 and 2008 , it totally hit the saturation point. You know, major labels signing anybody that had a leather jacket an electric guitar. Obviously we knew that was going to have an adverse reaction eventually, and it’s gone pretty far the other way. But we’ve been unaffected by it really, because as I said before our fan base means that things stay pretty constant for us, it’s actually worked in our advantage, what we represent is more pronounced now.