Wakefield's The Cribs on new album Night Network - 'I think it's the best album we've put out'

The Cribs' new album Night Network was recorded last year though it will always remind the band of 2020.
The CribsThe Cribs
The Cribs

They had split from their management and were thinking about calling time on The Cribs.

After playing a stadium gig at the Etihad in Manchester they got talking to Foo Fighters frontman and former Nirvana drummer Dave Grohl.

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A famously nice guy in the rock industry he invited them to record in the studio his band owns in Los Angeles.

It gave the Wakefield band something to focus on as they put aside their music business troubles and went back into the studio to record.

Ryan: “We wrote it in about two and a half sessions. After that we’d finished most of the music, so it was very immediate.

“We wanted to make something more soulful, more British sounding.

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“We’d made a couple of records. For All My Sisters and 24-7 had more of a US vibe, which is fine but I really felt with this record, it was written over here, and it was more idiosyncratic.

“It reminded me of how we wrote the first album. I think if you work fast you’re on the right track. There’s a few songs we did but I feel if you labour over it you’re on the wrong track.”

When single Never Thought I’d Feel Again came in October it was described, tongue-in-cheek, as Wakefield Motown,

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Ryan said: “Gary came up with that, Wakey was famous for rhubarb so you can’t come up with a good name there. It’s something .

"That’s always been an influence for us.

“When the band first started we were into 1950s girl group stuff and that was the main incentive for us to start a band. The Motown thing was original influences coming back.”

Critically the album has possibly been the best received of anything they have put out.

Ryan said: “I feel like it’s our best record, we always say our new records our best record but this one feel it has more gravity around it.

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“This record will always remind me of 2020, which sucks but you have to try and not let that come into it too much.”

With fingers crossed the band is hoping to tour next year.

The centrepiece of that tour will be a gig at the Piece Hall in Halifax on Sunday, June 20.

Gary said: “it’s almost like a utopian mirage to do Piece Hall next year. It’s almost like it’s so such a strange feeling to have a light at the end of the tunnel in a dark few months and it’s hard to get your hopes up, but I hope it will work to all our advantage because everyone will be missing live music.”

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