Live Review: Synth pop's potty-mouthed ‘minor internet hit singer’ returns to Craufurd Arms

Last time around, he was on tour with his band, aiming to top the Christmas singles chart with a profanity filled ditty about then PM Boris Johnson. (The track and a second variant of it reached number five in consecutive years).

Since then, he’s continued to bother the upper echelons of the UK singles chart with tracks about the monarchy and the Tories, has written a musical which has been adapted into a film and also co-hosts the monthly Acceptable In The 80s podcast.

The headline act in question? If you’ve previously seen any coverage of this artist on this website, you’ll know we’re not going to use his name.

He’s Basildon’s finest purveyor of synth pop and in 2018 published his autobiography, How I Became (and remained) A Minor Internet Hit Singer.

As usual, we’re just going to call him K. In recent years, K has been on tour with a live band, which, yep – we’re not going to name either!

However, on his 25 Years Of Hits Tour across the UK, K (and the Gang) are back performing solo, aided by what looked like an iPod shuffle and a suitcase of hand-puppets who make occasional appearances. Again, we’ll struggle to talk about those here.

On Saturday night, K - dressed in a lime yellow jumpsuit – performed two sets at the Milton Keynes venue.

So, what can we say! Well, over the course of around 20 songs, K performed tracks which covered topics including an ex-girlfriend, a former countdown host, male hygiene, an incident on a building site, men with beards, time spent in Travelodge hotels and his paperboy.

Nestled among those were also songs about Michael Jackson, Jimmy Savile and Ian Watkins.

By now, you’ll hopefully have the gist and have realised why we can’t really go into much more detail - other than to say each melded expertly crafted comedic lyricism and melodic sing-along choruses alongside infectious synth-pop hooks.

For this tour, K has been performing his set in a chronological order.

Between songs, he recited stories which included gaining traction in his hometown and the early days of touring and using early social media platforms such as Myspace and having his YouTube page repeatedly shut down. (Something he jokingly attributes to “Dark forces”).

K is no stranger to the Craufurd Arms and will always be linked to the venue thanks to a banner which originates from a performance at the Download festival.

We can’t really talk about what was written on the banner or the song it refers to – other than to explain it was K’s grandfather’s favourite expletive.

However, after thinking the original banner had been left in a muddy puddle at the annual metal festival, it subsequently turned up at the Craufurd Arms – only for it to be torn apart on a subsequent visit. And then reappear again. On Saturday, dozens of replicas were made for K’s return.

There were more stories about a gift from a ‘fan’ which we definitely can’t go into – and a genuinely emotional tribute to Lilly, K’s ‘adopted sister’ who he worked with during his career and who passed away in 2023.

One of the biggest sing-a-longs of the night came towards the end of the second set for the track, The Wrong Ian Watkins – a song highlighting the plight of Steps singer H.

In 2010, K wrote a musical about the disappearance of Shannon Matthews which was performed at the Edinburgh Festival and subsequently made into a film.

On Saturday, he was joined by ‘Detective Inspector Radgitt’ to perform a track from it.

Addressing the nature of his material, K jokes he didn’t intentionally set out looking to sing about taboo subjects, they just “came to him”.

Ahead of his finale, the 2022 top 20 single about The Duke Of York, K paused to add he believed the royal family were symptomatic with everything wrong with the country - before leading those inside the Craufurd Arms on a final sing-along which, yes you’ve guessed it, we can’t really describe either!