REVIEW: Crawlers - Turn Off The TV
- Julia Stark
- 11 minutes ago
- 3 min read
CRAWLERS have traversed rough tides over the last year, but with a clear horizon shimmering ahead of them the trio of best friends begin a new journey together, setting off to the hardened rhythms and uplifting words of knockout EP Turn Off The TV. Having established their musical skill on their previous album, The Mess We Seem To Make, their EP sees the trio now prove their ability to weave striking tracks seamlessly while providing their own self-catharsis on raw lyrics and sensational instrumental hooks.
The Warrington-based unit already know how to play the music industry game, but more than that they’ve learned to pick themselves up, dust off, and come back swinging. Turn Off The TV is a symbol of them laying down new, stronger foundations whilst also placing the fragments of their past in, sealing the cracks with the vulnerability and steadfast friendship so evident in the EP’s sound to create a base built on the hardships they went through together.
Opening track and first single released Afraid To Die isn’t the fear of dying, but the fear of everything you’ll leave behind. Borne from vocalist Holly Minto’s personal bouts of depression, she found a way to combat the self-isolation was through appreciating the small things in life that make it worthwhile. “I went on a great run one morning, and then Amy showed me how to make this really good porridge, and then Liv asked if we were gonna grab some drinks later. I realised I’d hate to die because that would mean I wouldn’t get more of this.” That sense of struggling and powering on comes through in the increasingly strengthening bass from Liv May and Amy Woodall’s addictive riffs, the track stripping away to a lone Minto’s lament before coming to the realisation “I’ve changed my mind”, the instruments steadily piling back in for a stirring, goosebump-inducing breakdown of defiance and triumph.
Stay Alive sounds like it should be a follow up to Afraid To Die, but instead it looks at the absurdity and anxiety brought on by the current state of the world, Minto singing without pause a litany of issues that are wilfully ignored in favour of comfort, accentuated by riffs and a racing drum beat that sounds like manifested anxiety.
Cool sounds exactly like its title, a mix between DON BROCO’s instrumentals, YONAKA’s attitude, and TINY’s range, a self-aware takedown of trying to mould yourself into everyone else’s expectations while the real world problems persist around us, in a Mean Girls-esque theme. May’s bass is thrillingly relentless as the melody gathers in volume and rage until Minto breaks the rose-coloured tint of appearance to scream “the world is fucking burning and you think I’m gonna play it cool?”
All We Have Is Us ends this short but sweet reintroduction to CRAWLERS continuing in the same vein as the other tracks, the lyrics baring all their exposed hurts and still questioning humanity’s reliance on things that separate us further with each passing day, the instruments colliding together for the chorus and Woodall spearing through with resonating hooks, creating a sound that’s full of desperation and hopeless hope. CRAWLERS welcomes in a new era that sees them writing for themselves and their truths.
Score: 8/10
Turn Off The TV was released on 14th August 2026 via Nettwerk.
Words: Julia Stark
Photos: Jess Meade
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