Album reviews: The Cribs – Night Network, and BTS – BE

The Cribs’ debut album was full of droll witticisms – here they let the guitars do the talking; K-pop stars BTS add another feather to their cap with a succinct new record

The Cribs (Steve Phillips/Carry On Press)

The Cribs – Night Network

★★★☆☆

The Cribs have always distanced themselves from any “scene”. While they are consistently lumped in with the “landfill indie” movement encompassing Maximo Park, Razorlight and The Pigeon Detectives, frontman Ryan Jarman recently told The Independent he felt The Cribs didn’t have anything to do with it. Interesting, then, that their new album Night Network is such an early Noughties throwback.

Opening track “Goodbye” is a red herring, with its Beach Boys harmonies and swooning Fleet Foxes melodies that recall “Like a Gift Giver”, from 2012’s In the Belly of the Brazen Bull. From there, things get considerably louder and bolshier. This is the first album produced by The Cribs themselves (at Dave Grohl’s studio in LA) after a falling out and subsequent legal battle with their former management company. They’ve done an OK job here, but the muddied mixing makes the whole thing feel flat, with a muffled tone that borders on soporific.

It doesn’t help that the band don’t seem to have much to say. Their self-titled debut, still their best album to date, was full of droll witticisms and showed a band who wanted be heard. On Night Network, though, they let the guitars do the talking: big soaring hooks on “Never Thought I’d Feel Again” and jangling Johnny Marr riffs on “Under the Bus Station Clock”. Over the moody grunge lines on “The Weather Speaks Your Name”, Jarman does his best Thurston Moore impression. Night Network isn’t a bad album, but it's not a particularly memorable one, either. ROC

BTS – BE

★★★★☆

When BTS release an album, it’s a global event. Fans across the world stay up all night, bathed in the blue light of their phones, hitting refresh until – finally! – it is available to stream. There has rarely been such a certain chart-topper as the K-pop juggernaut’s latest album BE. The same could be said, of course, of their last album – and the one before that. The shareholders aren’t sweating.

BE is a compact listening experience; the whole eight-track shebang comes in at just under 30 minutes. But in that half-hour, the seven-piece still manage to flit through styles – as has become their trademark.

Breathy vocals, introspective lyrics ("I just wanna be happier / Am I being too greedy?") and a sound that nods to heady Nineties R&B make “Blue and Grey” an apt anthem for the sad and sexy (read: horny) moods of lockdown. "Dis-ease" is another standout. The track doubles down on the nostalgia to throw it back to old-school hip-hop. Making the DJ scratch sound effect cool again in 2020 is another feather for their cap.

In just eight songs, BTS have accomplished the same genre-bending they usually do in double that runtime. And for the most part, the album avoids the pitfall of sounding like a checklist. With BE, BTS keep their foot on the pedal. AN