The queue stretches down through the glowing Shoreditch street for half a block. Someone’s cut out hundreds of pink cardboard hearts and they hand them out so we can all hold them up during the show. A nervous teen walks up and down the queue, offering us handmade beaded friendship bracelets embellished with the names of Crawlers’ songs. There’s something about their music which inspires heartfelt devotion and draws the young and marginalised to them like hoody-clad moths to a flame. They capture the intangible experience of existing as a human in society and that thread is what has amassed the Liverpudlians a huge fanbase in an incredibly short time.
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Crawlers live at Rough Trade East
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Crawlers @ Rough Trade East (Paul Lyme)
“Happy Valentine’s Day! I’m so happy to be spending it with the loves of my life, you guys!” Vocalist Holly Minto is very much the welcoming hostess as we cram in amongst the racks of vinyl in the institution of a record store that is Rough Trade East. They open with Call It Love and soft waves of sunrise waft in every lyric. Gently we sing along, tapping into a bittersweet mental photo album of creased images of relationships past, reassured by Olivia Kettle’s intimate bass. A sacred solemnity spreads as Minto begins Would You Come To My Funeral, and she smiles in spite of herself at the crispness of our shared singing. She sings of the hope that each of us will achieve the minimum which at times can seem impossible. Love is their preoccupation, in all its youthful agony and ecstasy, as they share an unreleased song, What I Know Is What I Love. Crawlers channel the outsider energy blueprint of Kim Deal and early Radiohead but building something new and intriguing from that foundation.
The Liverpool-hailing quartet are very aware of their place in the world and how rapidly their music has expanded in the five years since their formation. “We’re a band who haven’t even put out an album out yet,” exclaims the 23-year-old frontwoman, in awe. Their debut album was two days away from dropping at this point in time. “Crawlers is not just for people who started a band in a shed any more, Crawlers is for all of us. It’s you who did that to our music.” There really is a sense that the crowd have adopted each song as personal to them, and it’s easy to see why. Kills Me To Be Kind is full of swelling watercolour guitar which mingles with rapt attention and whispers of heartache, and taps into a universal repressed fear of inadequacy. Minto asks that we not record Kiss Me because it’s “just for us”, and her faded wail opens a ray of healing hope with its plea for affirmation and acknowledgement. Finally the roar she’s been holding in her chest escapes and Amy Woodall’s playful guitar scatters glitter on the emerging images.
The song that started it all, viral TikTok track Come Over (Again), tugs at any still knotted emotional cords. We raise the pink sugar paper hearts we were handed outside and clutch them, our hands silhouetted against the beautiful agony lingering from the nineties and refashioned by Crawlers. Minto drapes herself in a trans pride flag as we’re conducted in a Seattle era basement chorus and she lets the last note hum and linger before running offstage to begin the band’s signing session. The Shoreditch streets outside feel cold after the outpouring of warmth from Crawlers’ set, and while it may have only been a short sample of their music, they’re bound to return and expand on their deeply intriguing and personally affecting sound.
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Crawlers live at Rough Trade East
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Crawlers @ Rough Trade East (Paul Lyme)
Review of Crawlers at Rough Trade East, London on 14th February 2024 by Kate Allvey. Photography by Paul Lyme.
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