For a band that often get unfairly dismissed as lo-fi racket makers, the Cribs have worked with some pretty interesting and varied people. Their second and third albums were produced by Edwyn Collins and Franz Ferdinand's Alex Kapranos respectively, while that latter album, Men's Needs, Women's Needs, Whatever, also featured a cameo from Sonic Youth's Lee Ranaldo. For 2009's Ignore the Ignorant the band hired a new guitarist, the little known Johnny Marr, who then left after sessions for the band's fifth album "weren't really working". Back to the core three-piece of brothers Gary, Ross and Ryan Jarman, the band's forthcoming album, In the Belly of the Brazen Bull, was recorded in New York with knob-twiddler David Fridmann (Mercury Rev, Flaming Lips) and in Chicago with Steve Albini, whose dry-as-a-bone work seems to influence the Nirvanaesque first single Come on, Be a No One. Short, instant and with a brilliantly shouty chorus that seems to go "for yooooouuuuu ayyyyyyy", it's a welcome reminder of the pop hooks the band have always managed to crowbar into everything they've done. The video is a fairly rudimentary life-on-the-road document, but keep an eye out for singer Ryan sporting a rather fetching Freddie Mercury-inspired leather jacket.
• In the Belly of the Brazen Bull is out on 7 May on Wichita Recordings.
