Men's Needs

"Men's Needs"
Single by The Cribs
from the album Men's Needs, Women's Needs, Whatever
B-side	"The Fairer Sex" "Men's Needs (CSS Remix)" "Tonight" "I've Tried Everything (Acoustic)"
Released	May 14, 2007
Format	CD, 7" Vinyl
Recorded	2007
Genre	Indie rock, post-punk revival
Length	3:15
Label	Wichita Recordings
Writer(s)	Gary Jarman, Ryan Jarman, Ross Jarman
Producer	Alex Kapranos
The Cribs singles chronology
"You're Gonna Lose Us" (2005) "Men's Needs" (May 2007) "Moving Pictures" (2007)

"Men's Needs" is the first single from British indie rock band The Cribs' third album Men's Needs, Women's Needs, Whatever, which was released on 14 May 2007. It was available to listen to on the band's MySpace page^[1]. It was recorded in Vancouver, British Columbia in 2006 and was produced by Franz Ferdinand vocalist and guitarist Alex Kapranos. The song reached #17 in the UK Singles Chart, the band's highest chart position. The song was also #3 on the NME Songs of the Year 2007, named Single of the Year by the Metro (Associated Metro Limited) paper and finished in the Top 100 Songs in the Rolling Stone in the United States.

In 2009, NME magazine named it as one of the "Songs of the Decade", saying that the song took them "from cult favourites to one of Britain's best loved bands". In October 2011, NME placed it at number 98 on its list "150 Best Tracks of the Past 15 Years".^[2]

Music video

The music video^[3], directed by Diane Martel, depicts the band playing the song in front of a yellow background. A nude woman (censored before the watershed) licks and kisses vocalist and guitarist Ryan Jarman, dances and trashes amplifiers, performs household tasks, punches the band members, and generally wreaks havoc. Near the middle of the video, she throws a knife at drummer Ross Jarman and severs his arm. She then cuts off Ryan's head, which remains in her arms for his guitar solo. Both have their limbs back on their bodies for the third verse. The band being oblivious to all these actions is the concept of this video, tying into the lyrics "Men's needs are lost on me".

The graphic nature of the video led to it being banned from MTV2 before the watershed due to an Ofcom complaint about the violence in the video being "too shocking for a daytime audience". Three versions of the video exist: the first is the censored described above (with black bars covering the woman's breasts, genitalia and buttocks), the second shows the woman wearing a leotard in place of the black bars, the third is the uncensored version. The video has been viewed over 6 and a half million times on YouTube, becoming a near viral phenomenon.

Track listing

CD

1. "Men's Needs"
2. "Fairer Sex"

7" Vinyl #1

1. "Men's Needs"
2. "Tonight"

7" Vinyl #2

1. "Men's Needs"
2. "I've Tried Everything" (Acoustic)

Download

1. "Men's Needs" - Principal Participant Remix

Footnotes

1. ^ "The Cribs' MySpace page". www.myspace.com. http://www.myspace.com/thecribs. 
2. ^ http://www.nme.com/list/150-best-tracks-of-the-past-15-years/248648/page/6
3. ^ "Men's Needs video- Black bar censored version". www.youtube.com. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCNTYi9fHuo. 

3 Uncensored version http://vimeo.com/11555120

External links

• The music video
• The Cribs' official site
• The Cribs' official MySpace page
• The Cribs' record label, Wichita Recordings' site