With the 10-year anniversary tour of their beloved third album, Men’s Needs, Women’s Needs Whatever, still ringing in their ears, it would have been tempting for The Cribs to try to recapture former glories, but instead the band have decided to go back to basics.
24-7 Rock Star Shit discards the poppier elements of 2015's For All My Sisters in favour of the tougher side of the Jarman brothers' unvarnished truth. With Steve Albini at the helm it's business as usual for the lo-fi producer: the album was recorded in just five days, retaining that visceral demo-style urgency. Everything feels beefy and brutish. Lyrics are half snarled on the driving In Your Palace and the brattish whine of the infectious Rainbow Ridge with its Nirvana-like melody. Things truly break open on the razor sharp The Year of Hate, an atonal yelp of rage that spirals into spiking loops of bruising aggression like Sonic Youth at their most vital.
24-7 Rock Star Shit is an uncompromising detour that not many of their contemporaries would be willing to take. It’s not the album to propel them into the arms of the mainstream, but The Cribs seem more at home in this distinctive, ramshackle cul-de-sac.
