UK rising stars Crawlers guide us track by track through their debut album ‘The Mess We Seem To Make’, out now via Polydor.
Meaningless Sex
“‘Meaningless Sex’ encompasses the feeling of using sex as affirmation and to feel loved intimately. It takes you through the lens of having meaningless sex with someone but wanting them to stay the night, using sex as a coping mechanism as an excuse of doing things uncomfortably just to have some sort/or any connection. Being the first song on the album, we wanted it to set the tone both thematically and sonically by encapsulating our tendency to make songs big and bold, yet still have a weird but modern quality to it.”
Kiss Me
“‘Kiss Me’ speaks about trying to get out of using sex as a coping mechanism, and allowing yourself to feel loved without sacrificing your body. When being in a hetero relationship despite being queer you can use sex for validation and as an answer to what society tells you to do, but you feel a new found bliss in the comfort of that intimacy when in a relationship that your mind understands. Whether this be because you love someone, feel comfortable around them or simply with someone of the right identity.”
Hit It Again
“‘Hit It Again’ is about excusing your problems with your self awareness, when in actual fact you are just as affected by your problems as somebody who isn’t as self aware as you. ‘Drugs aren’t fun when you do them alone’ shines light on the fact that drug use, and any other problem, is fine so long as you have an excuse. This, of course, is not true.”
Better If I Just Pretend
“When you see somebody who was once a huge part of your life and, for the sake of being a better person, you say nothing negative about them. Sometimes it’s better if you just pretend that nothing happened and that you simply grew apart, when the
true reason you no longer speak is a lot darker.”
Would You Come To My Funeral
“Have you ever wondered whether or not a certain person would come to your funeral? A person who was once a big part of your life, but now you haven’t spoken in years. That’s what this song is about. I feel as though it’s a question we
have all asked ourselves at some point in our lives, but we will all live our lives never knowing the answer to that question. We originally thought the song would lend itself to a slow and emotional arrangement, giving it a much softer energy. However, when we were tracking drums in the studio and playing around with the song, we quickly realised that it lended itself to being an upbeat and energetic track, but still with an emotional sentiment.”
Golden Bridge
**TW, SUICIDE MENTION: “‘Golden Bridge’ is about the romanticization and idealistic mentality of the dark thoughts that come to us when we think about ending our life. These romanticisation that exist in the world tend to take away from the travesty of what it is to be suicidal. Describing this feeling as walking the ‘Golden Bridge’ is a beautiful way of describing the most blood curdling feeling and how in actual fact, you should say it how it is. The song pays tribute to everything in Holly’s life that kept them on the right path during this period, such as their first nephew being born (who is laughing in the track if you listen very carefully) and to the fans of our music who helped us in doing what we love for a living.”
Come Over (again)
“This song is about grieving someone who was once in your life. Someone who ruined everything but was such a huge part of you. It plays on the fury and anger that grows within you when you remember how easy it was for this person to throw
everything away. It tells the tale of two people in one song, and how they are both dealing with the same grief in different contexts. This song of course means everything to us. It was our big break that not only gave us all of the opportunities we’ve been given, but proved to us how capable we are as a band at pushing our own boundaries and not being afraid to make any kind of music, as long as we know it feels right to do so.”
Kills Me To Be Kind
“Breaking up with someone when there is nothing wrong is hard. You try and create excuses for the reason you shouldn’t be together and what’s worse is the fact that being kind to them hurts because you know you’re going to hurt them in the long run. This is especially hard when both people in the relationship are struggling with their sense of self and use each other to find any meaning in life, rather than because there is any love there.”
What I Know Is What I Love
“‘What I Know Is What I Love’ is about how living in the modern age is becoming habitual with things that hurt you and about how you have to become used to the chaos. Loving things that we know will harm us like relationships, drugs, cigarettes and social media should make us reassess our values and how we want to live our lives, but it doesn’t. Instead, we go back to these things because of the immediate gratification, rather than trying to sustain ourselves with healthier obsessions.”
I End Up Alone
“It is getting a lot harder to own something in our generation (Gen Z), so we get used to renting things. Cars, apartments and even relationships. It has become a constant to be in situationships and be afraid of commitment rather than dedicating and providing full confidence in a person. And it is the worst feeling to be the person someone ‘rents’ before they find their full home. It’s a manic pixie dream girl anthem, basically.”
Call It Love
“‘Call It Love’, following a similar vein, is about thinking something is love after you are so used to being treated badly, because you have formed an attachment to that chaos. You constantly dance with the push and pull of a toxic relationship until you’re conditioned to think that the way you’re being treated is normal, when it isn’t.”
Nighttime Affair
“The album closer, ‘Nighttime Affair’, summarises all the feelings in one lament – capturing the essence of self hatred, using sex and other coping mechanisms for comfort and lacking in self worth for being the second best, but still thinking its love and not caring despite the self awareness. The song ends with a moment of reflection, thinking about everything that has hurt you. Instead of letting these thoughts spiral and control you, you reflect on them and use them as affirmations of your own strength and self worth.”
