Growing old disgracefully - and making it sound like great fun!
There comes a point in every punk rocker’s life when staying out until four in the morning looking for rebellion stops being as attractive as a nice early night… I’m certainly not saying that Junk Punk protagonists Crapsons have reached that point – but they are more than happy to sing about it!
Formed in Birkenhead from the sort of drunken pub conversation that has probably produced more worthwhile bands than any music college ever managed, Mike Markey, Neil Crud and Andy Gilbert have spent the past few years doing things the traditional way, piling into vans, playing wherever anyone will let them, releasing EPs of short, sharp blasts of noise, and gradually becoming rather good at it.
They’ve also shared stages with The Undertones, Half Man Half Biscuit, UK Subs and Steve Ignorant, which gives you a reasonable indication of the musical neighbourhood they inhabit.
Now, frighteningly, they’ve made a proper album 😱
‘Sunshine On Keith’ is essentially the sound of three men staring middle age squarely in the face and deciding to take the piss out of it before it gets the chance to do the same to them – and there’s something wonderfully unheroic about it.
Opening track ‘Waiting For Armageddon’ sets out the problem rather neatly. Once upon a time, you went to Glastonbury, stayed up all night and considered sleep an irritating interruption to the important business of drinking yourself insensible. Now the prospect of an early night can genuinely become the highlight of the weekend. Armageddon may indeed be coming. Just preferably not after half ten…
That mixture of mortality and stupidity and irritation runs right through the record. This is supposedly a coming-of-age album, except Crapsons have sensibly waited until well into adulthood before attempting that one!
‘RIP Gary’, ‘Beer Fear’, ‘We’re Not Allowed Nice Things’ and ‘Monday Morning’ all occupy that peculiarly British, and particularly northern landscape, where disappointment isn’t so much a tragedy as part of the weekly timetable. It’s clear that Crapsons delight in finding magnificence in the mundane.
There are no great rock-star declarations here. Instead, we get hangovers, work, ageing, bad luck, cheap hotels, mice and church bells. It’s kitchen-sink Punk, except it seems (irritatingly) the fucking plughole’s blocked again!
Musically, the ingredients are uncomplicated. Mike Markey handles bass and shouty lead vocals, Neil Crud guitar and vocals and Andy Gilbert drums and backing vocals. Loud fuzzy guitar, bass pushed well forward, drums hit as though they’ve personally caused offence and choruses intended to survive first contact with a sweaty pub audience.
But that simplicity is part of their appeal.
The danger with humour in Punk is that the joke can become more important than the song. Crapsons generally avoid that trap because, underneath all the daftness, there’s a proper understanding of why Punk works: momentum, repetition, a memorable line and knowing when to stop. Sometimes very quickly.
‘Girl On The Side Of The Road’ is probably the Crapsons’ idea of a love song, which already sounds like sufficient warning. But It’s a genuinely funny, if tragic, story.
Indeed, ‘Sunshine On Keith‘ might spend most of its time laughing at life, but there’s affection running through it too — for friendships, gigs, stupid stories and all those tiny incidents that somehow end up defining a life.
‘I’ve Got A Hard Hat On’ and ‘Netflix & Kill’ take us from some surreal political references and into living room horror film ‘Gogglebox’ territory, while ‘Those Fucking Church Bells’ may be one of the finest examples of the band’s enduring ability to transform minor irritation into legitimate protest, even including a lovely nod to Cat Stevens’ ‘Morning Has Broken‘… So – forget overthrowing capitalism – some bastard bell has woken them up.
It’s similarly followed by ‘There’s A Mouse!’, suggesting any revolution may have been postponed indefinitely while they deal with a rodent infestation.
And then comes ‘Calvin Harris Owes Us £20’. Apparently, Harris once found his way into Crapfest without paying. In fairness, he maintains that he did, but Crapsons maintain otherwise. Most bands would perhaps regard this as a minor administrative disagreement. Crapsons wrote a song about it. Quite right too.
But the album saves its biggest guest for last.
‘Fuck Off For Good’ features none other than Steve Ignorant, completing what the band describe as their “trilogy of ‘Fuck Off’ songs”. There is something beautifully appropriate about the former Crass frontman appearing at the end of an album devoted largely to getting older, getting annoyed and wondering where your youth disappeared to? It also gives the record a little extra bite at precisely the point where another joke might have worn thin.
That’s important, because ‘Sunshine On Keith’ isn’t perfect. Twelve songs built from similar ingredients inevitably means a couple of ideas land harder than others, and anyone requiring sweeping musical reinvention should probably seek assistance elsewhere. But musical reinvention isn’t really the point.
Recorded at Crosstown Studios in Liverpool with producer and engineer Jon Lawton, then mastered by Russ Hayes at Orange Studios in Penmaenmawr, ‘Sunshine On Keith’ feels appropriately rooted in its north-west surroundings.
The Crapsons’ great strength is that they appear completely uninterested in pretending to be anything grander than they are. They’re three blokes from Birkenhead making noisy Punk rock about the lives immediately around them. And those lives turn out to be surprisingly fertile territory! The result is a Punk record which makes it clear that middle age supplies us all with entirely new things to be pissed off about…
Released on 2nd October through their own label Crap Records, get your copy of ‘Sunshine On Keith’ from HERE
Catch Crapsons live on their final 2026 tour dates:
- Fri 23 Oct – OXFORD O2 Academy (Supporting Half Man Half Biscuit)
- Fri 13 Nov – MORECAMBE Punk Festival (The Alhambra Theatre)
Side One
- Waiting For Armageddon
- RIP Gary
- Beer Fear
- We’re Not Allowed Nice Things
- Monday Morning
- Girl on the Side of the Road
Side Two
- I’ve Got a Hard Hat On
- Netflix & Kill
- Those Fucking Church Bells
- There’s A Mouse!
- Calvin Harris Owes Us £20
- Fuck Off For Good (feat. Steve Ignorant)
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Writer, lyricist, and guitarist with The Viral Breakdowns, radio presenter and passionate protagonist of Punk! From teenage rocker in the seventies, to playing my own original music in far flung parts of the world, I have a love for fast, loud, short sharp tunes with attitude and edge. Based in Chelmsford, you can find me out and about on the Essex and London music scene or rooting through the racks of record fairs, markets and car boot sales, looking for hidden punk rock treasures.
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