by Glen Screeton
WARRINGTON’S Crawlers recently completed their biggest shows to date as our music correspondent caught up with the band in unchartered territory at a sell-out gig at The Invisible Wind Factory in Liverpool.
Stepping outside of my usual reporting area, editor Gary Skentelbery invited me to review the band ‘Crawlers’ at The Invisible Wind Factory in Liverpool on Saturday 23rd September.
If the reader has not been to this venue (as I hadn’t) you can read about it here : https://www.invisiblewindfactory.com/
Suffice to say, this all-black, cavernous room with huge wind related art installations hanging from the ceiling, a huge stage at one end and a bar at the other was ideally suited for the Crawlers “homecoming gig”, and although I wasn’t too familiar with the band I had done my homework and consulted Spotify and You Tube for the playlist .
Furthermore, I found an article from the March 2022 edition of Music Magazine NME that reported ‘Merseyside misfits making striking alt-rock with a powerful message’ , and referred to them as a ‘Liverpool Gang’ . However us Northerner’s always like to quantify such statements, especially when guitarist Amy Woodall and bassist Liv May are Warringtonians, and with Holly Minto on lead vocals and Harry Breen on drums I read the band had created a unique following for their ‘genreless and genderless music’ , although I believe ‘misfits’ is going a bit far. I just see a likeable group of ex-performing arts students who have encouraged a huge Tik -Tok audience to join in on their musical journey and share their own personal feelings along the way. The difference being that through sheer hard work the band chose to personally engage with their devoted fans (affectionately known as Crawlers) at every opportunity- very refreshing.
Tonight was such an occasion and shortly after 9pm the band is on stage for the near capacity crowd of 1500 revellers and Holly greets them with “the biggest headline act for us so far!” much to everybody’s delight, before the drum and bass kick in. It is a deep and heavy sound and initially it is difficult to hear the melody and the early vocals are a bit muddy, but kudos to the sound engineers as it was quickly balanced by the second number and it wasn’t long before Holly took command of the crowd with enormous confidence. When she said “I want everybody to jump” they jumped, and the audience were quickly pogoing around punk style in the friendliest mosh-pit I have seen. In this diverse and culture embracing crowd there is no shortage of coloured hair, piercings, top – hats and tutu’s and for some reason blow up aliens seem to be the order of the evening!
But what about the music?? To be honest it’s not all my type, although I do like the solo electro-acoustic numbers from Holly, she has a very clear voice with lyrics expressed in a sweet, high and low drawling style adding emotion to some (perhaps) difficult themes, there are also some clever effects from someone lurking at the back of the stage which adds plenty of colour to the songs and continues throughout the performance. However, readers shouldn’t let my own opinion detract from what is an excellent performance, after all what a boring world it would be if we all liked the same music, check them out yourself!
From a marketing perspective it is interesting to see how the ‘Crawlers’ developed their large fanbase across social media and having signed to Polydor Records in 2022 I’m sure they will be welcomed with open arms on their short upcoming tour of North America in October. I certainly hope so, but I wonder if a drink in Friars Court will ever be the same again for Amy and Liv?
Read about ‘Crawlers’ at www.crawlersband.com where you can access all their social media platforms.
uk tour leg completed and our biggest shows to date done — eu low but still available now 🥀 — https://t.co/GPHRcdpdJO pic.twitter.com/XrV5RSIZYR
— CRAWLERS (@CrawlersHQ) September 25, 2023
Can’t believe this actually happened, thank you to everyone who took part and helped make this moment💚
📸: @AceofSkyes @creepycrawlerhq @CrawlersHQ pic.twitter.com/pFCtRUecu1
— Creative Director Loz (@underscore_Loz) September 24, 2023
