“We are The Cribs and we are from Wakefield.”  After the line was said – the iconic songs began to be sung and the crowd for the bands’ third night of their residency at Manchester’s Gorilla, on Sunday December 10, transitioned into raucous karaoke – falling madly at the feet of their heroes, The Cribs.  The annual tour, dubbed ‘Cribsmas’, was celebrating its 10th year anniversary, and seen The Cribs performing each song they have put out since forming in 2002, over three consecutive shows at venues across the country.

Manchester’s Gorilla is acclaimed for being one of the city’s premium venues and being more than well prepared for four sold-out nights of the Jarman brothers and their collective of fans. You would have thought that there would have been a lingering Glaswegian hangover amongst the trio (having just performed four nights at King Tuts Wah Wah Hut)  but, any hint of delirium was neither shown nor felt.

Numerous die-hard fans attended more than one night, in the hope of getting closer to their icons.  The Cribs, of course, have an undeniably loyal network of devotees.

The switch-up of support acts, including PINS and Dream Wife as well as local talent hand-picked from each city, meant that each night was that little bit different  The advent-calendar-like selection of support shows that The Cribs are still a relevant punk band today (despite being fifteen years old) and are clearly extremely aware of the punk revival climbing upwards around them, with fresh thriving talent.  The support act for the third Cribs show at Gorilla was PAWS.

The main event, The Cribs.  Tracks such as ‘Men’s Needs’ and ‘We Were Aborted’ brought the singalong factor and featured amongst the set, both performed by the band who are widely known for having acquired multiple guises over the years. A whirl of pop-tinted tracks were brought from their For All My Sisters album and crowd-pleasing, brash, classic-Cribs from the likes of ‘Mirror Kisses’ and ‘Come On, Be a No One’, which set the crowd rife with heavenly guitar strums and the haunting voices of Gary and Ryan Jarman.

The Cribs prove time and time again that they are true to their fans, dedicated to their sound and above all inspirational as a rarity amongst modern-day lo-fi artists.

Hannah Tinker