Last Sunday Edinburgh’s Corn Exchange played host to one of the most solid 3 band line-ups I’ve ever seen – The Cribs supported by their Wichita label-mates Los Campesinos! and Sky Larkin.
The first band on stage were up-and-coming Leeds-based trio Sky Larkin (8/10) who have recently been highlighted alongside The XX, Memory Tapes and Florence & The Machine in the iTunes Picks of 2009. Imagine a tighter, slightly more mature Kabeedies and you’re not far wrong. The band kicked off their set with Antibodies - the stand out track from their debut album Golden Spike, released earlier this year. The song is 3 and a half minutes of toe-tapping indie with a ridiculously catchy chorus that is still stuck in my head many days later. Other highlights include Matador, a wonderful indie-pop track, the main guitar riff and cymbal heavy drum-line effortlessly conjuring up the image of lazy summer evenings. Featuring the most determined looking drummer possibly ever and a charismatic lead singer who already shows she knows how to command a situation with ease Sky Larkin are a band who will only get bigger and better in 2010.
Next to perform were possibly the best live band in the country at the moment – Los Campesinos! (9/10) The twee English 7-piece took to the stage as the venue began to fill up properly and handled the crowd with far more assurance than you would expect from a support band, particularly one quite musically different from the headline act. It does of course help that in Gareth Campesinos! they have one of the great British front-men of the last decade and that their music is earnest, heartfelt and fun. Despite a slightly shaky start the band soon get on track and take songs from both of their first two albums, getting the crowd worked up with fan favourites You! Me! Dancing!, Miserabilia and My Year in Lists amongst others. Perhaps most impressive were the two tracks from new album Romance is Boring, due out in the UK in February of next year. The Sea is a Good Place to Think About the Future in particular takes the band in a darker, more atmospheric direction and the relatively sweeping vastness of the song is emphasised even more when performed live, which is quite a feat. The set is concluded with the stomping, raucous Sweet Dreams, Sweet Cheeks part of which is played with Gareth singing from the middle of the crowd which is now totally and utterly on his side. Los Campesinos! tour the UK again in February, returning to Edinburgh on the 17th to play the far more intimate Bongo Club, an experience which can not be recommended highly enough.
The final, headline act of the night were The Cribs (7.5/10) a band who have come a long way since the last time I saw them live, supporting The Ordinary Boys nearly 5 years ago. As well as adding an all-time legend of music to their ranks in the shape of Johnny Marr they have had a top 10 album in Ignore the Ignorant and a top 20 single with 2007’s Men’s Needs. They’ve also got a tighter, better developed stage presence, even if Johnny Marr does seem to do his best to play despite of, rather than for, the crowd of adoring fans below him. The development of their performance The Cribs has been coupled with the build up of a quite formidable back catalogue including hits such as Hey Scenesters!, Cheat on Me and You Were Always The One which get the nearly full Corn Exchange bouncing and yelling along. The chemistry and energy of The Cribs live performance is undeniable and transfers to the crowd, who are highly receptive to it, becoming a heaving jumping mass. Whilst there was something of a lull about 2/3 of the way through their set as the mellower and newer songs got rolled the band took it to a strong finish that included the quite outstanding Mirror Kissers.
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