Loss, Love & Lust: An Interview With Lupen Crook

There’s no point in beating around the bush, so I’m just going to come straight out with it: I’m convinced that Lupen Crook is one of the most important artists currently operating in the UK. There’s a sense of visceral honesty emanating from his work that I’ve only encountered in a handful of other performers during my thirty-plus years of music obsession.
With a back catalogue of songs covering difficult truths frequently couched in riddle and metaphor, a musical canon that blasts its way through conventional genres with little regard for collateral damage and a larger-than-life personality that sometimes wilfully seems to court the reputation of idiot savant and awkward bastard, there are plenty of potential barriers to understanding and enlightenment.
However, listen with patience and an open mind and you’ll be rewarded by an astonishing command of melody and rhythm, a fertile collection of lyrics covering a broad range of recurring, universal preoccupations and a voice that tells you as much – or as little – as you’re willing to hear. If art is the divining of the unique and the original, this is some of the purest art you’re likely to encounter.
I had so many questions. The first thing I wanted to explore was that name – suggestive of wolf, flower, thief, instrument of control, sickness, anger – and how it encapsulates his creativity…
I’m constantly fascinated by the way that so many contemporary musicians tend to adopt a different identity (as expressed by their name) as part of the process of conveying their vision to the world. Where did ‘Lupen Crook’ come from and who is he?

Role play and fantasy, the idea that we can transcend our normal selves and for a moment live the life of something other than a figure in the mirror. Most people view their existence, in some way at least, as being mundane and unsatisfactory to the way they once imagined. A child’s vision of what they see themselves as in the future is a vision rarely met, more often than not it is left to waste away, eventually considered unrealistic and impossible.
Even those lucky few who consider their dream achieved find the reality is quite different from the childish original. Even the loose frenzy of madness has its problems. Like most, since a very young age I have toyed with the imaginary world of aliens, alter egos, alternative realities and Lupen Crook is no different. Though I have accepted that adulthood won’t ever satisfy the child inside of me, I am obsessed and unwavering in my pursuit for small moments that remind me that those fantasies once existed and therefore do exist.
To have your feet buried in the ground with the roots and worms and a head in the clouds gazing stars and strange unidentified shapes is where I stand now. The body can bend, break and take the brunt of everything else.
Do you feel that as Lupen Crook you’re consciously in character like an actor, or is it more a case of forging this new identity in order to express who you “really” are?
Lupen Crook had originally satisfied a creative longing, in that I had given birth to this elusive character. A character who, free from sexual, social or spiritual restraints, became a name and person that I would live through. He was a character that in the minds eye I could fabricate a past, present and supposed future.
Lupen Crook formed a material safety blanket that I wrapped myself up in, thus allowing feelings that were felt and found difficult to put in plain words and also feelings that were perhaps not so natural or even external to myself, though were nonetheless of great interest to me, more comfortable to explore.
Looking back, the insecure and confused in me created this blanket and I am glad to say his inclusion in my life has given me the ability to work through the vast and vicious colours and characterisations that we all fight and fondle with, the pleasures and pains of growing up in such a strange bewildering world.
Your Medway origins are well documented. They’re also a recurring feature of many of your lyrics, from “Dick Strange…” to “Ode To Fucking Everyone”, as well as in other areas of your output such as your recent MySpace blog posts. How important is this sense of place to you?
The Medway Towns [a conurbation in Kent comprising five towns on the River Medway: Strood, Rochester, Chatham, Gillingham and Rainham] is a fascinating place. I have been both its prisoner and patriarch for twenty-six years now. I call it Invicta’s Belly. Victor being a giant wandering beast of low mental attention, who in a time long past grazed on the green grass valleys of Kent, wet his tongue on the swamps and clusters of branch and other debris. I imagine he happened upon this cruel ground and greedily ate it up.
Unbeknown to dear Victor, spider mites and nasty worms that’d formed under the shadow of London’s over-hang entered through his mouth and down into his belly. There they partied for days and weeks on end in idle celebration of their escape from the ground they’d grown out of and remained up until this moment trapped. Victor grew terribly ill that night, clutching his stomach and cursing the Gods he forced fingers down his throat to retrieve and expel whatever evil had entered into him.
His new residents were stubborn though, fighting back against the bile and causing cramps that would eventually see Victor fall back and find death. Those spider mites and dirt worms are our ancestors. We are stubborn and aggressive, we take part in idle celebrations and fight back against the bile of those who wish to expel and cleanse themselves of us.
Medway Council don’t tell you that in their brochure, but I shit you not: it’s all true.
You were talking earlier this year about fostering some kind of informal movement of locally based, like-minded artistic peers called the Medway Non League Extreme. Can you tell us more about this? Is there anything tangible to share, or is it more a statement of intent?
Non League Extreme is nothing but an idea, though it is an idea all the same and that is definitely something – a statement of intent at least. What will it be? Only what we make it. If it remains just a concept then that is fine by me, what exists here will continue like the defiant might it is, with or without a title. I believe along with a few others that it provides an accurate description of the attitude and diverse movement that is festering beneath the underground of The Medway Towns and perhaps even further afield. Time will undoubtedly tell.
From a Medway perspective, London sometimes seems to be just on its doorstep and yet at other times it feels like it’s light years away. You’ve poked fun at the ‘London scene’ in ‘Junk ‘n’ Jubilee’, yet you regularly play gigs there. Do you have something of a love-hate relationship with the place?
There is so much to London. My experience up until this year has been performing, which has been to a certain extent sitting on my perch feeling disgusted by the vicious circles of social interaction that define the ‘scene’ up there. I still fucking hate it.
Having grown up a little now – and with my experience in New York – I realise that it is not the individuals but the groups themselves that are so devilish. Always a vampire close by, though it is these people that I feel sorry for. It seems the need to define oneself in such a demanding and broad-minded place overwhelms the need to simply exist as an individual. Those initially appearing as leaders of these fashionable packs are often those truly lost. A spiritless twit carried around on the current of conformity under the illusion of individuality and revolution.
Having been homeless since January, I have taken to wandering without intent and London has proved a great inspiration. With my only company being my disposable Argos guitar (a handy weapon if the need ever arise) and notepad, I have spent days and nights on the streets in separation from the London I have previously been exposed to. Through isolating myself and moving freely through the streets I have experienced the true city and I can say it is a wealth of experience and interest.
I have made my time with a great variety of people, from the grey suits to street whores and all else between, though have not yet felt the claustrophobic frustration I normally associate with the place because I travel on my own, and my intention has only been to experience myself in alien environment.
You recently spent a couple of weeks in New York. How were you received by an American audience? Would you like to go back? Did being in New York give you any kind of new perspective on yourself, the band and your output?
I didn’t visit New York; I lived there for sixteen days. I became its resident. We were lucky enough to have some very kind people who welcomed us into their homes and gave us the option of resting our heads whenever the need arose. I rediscovered my role as a songwriter and artist and that has spurned my constant wandering of late.
Plans to go back are being formed as we speak, though Tom Murderbird is in charge of that side of things. My role this year is writing and besides, everything I attempt to organise other than these songs seems to fall flat on its face, for I am absolutely and undeniably the most disorganised creature in England, perhaps in nature.
Your earlier material was broadly acoustic and then for a while you veered quite markedly towards a harder punk/garage rock sound. More recently – both in solo performances and as a band – you seem to be returning to the “unplugged” style. How do you see things evolving from here?
As I have already said, the last few years have been littered with personal and professional disorder and looking back, musically this has been evident. However, I have found my source again and know where I am heading as far as the subject of my songs is concerned. I think also my relationship with the Langridge brothers [i.e. The Murderbirds] is now fully formed and we are beginning to find our feet as a team of musicians.
In the past, creating a ‘sound’ has never been our prerogative and with so many songs flying around we’ve ran wild down a thousand avenues with no real sense of why or where it may lead us. Sorry to go back to our trip to New York, but that really sorted some things out. At the time I wasn’t strictly allowed in the country, that and financial reasons meant we were unable to bring our full set up so as hand luggage we carried two guitars and a Cajon box for Bob to bang on. It allowed the acoustic element that we had lost or left behind to reappear naturally.
For the next while whilst I write, we plan to build on that and experiment, keeping a mind’s eye on what we’ve learnt in New York. It feels great to be building back a band from nothing, just a couple of guitars and a wooden box. I believe this next record will be our most concise and complete record to date.
Your songs hint at such a huge range of musical influences, yet in terms of genre they can be quite difficult to pin down. Is this the result of a concerted effort to be original, or simply the completely intuitive result of what happens when you start to write?
I have always found this question difficult. My role as a songwriter is not to bother myself with the writing of songs, but to welcome experience and incident no matter what the consequence. As long as I have a guitar to hand then those experiences will naturally manifest themselves as songs. This is the reason why I find myself in such constant difficulty, because that random and reckless way of living is my muse.
Unfortunately – and what those close to me have come to realise – is that my best material comes when I cannot afford the comforts normally associated with nowadays. I am selfish to my obsession and this is why I have no plans to fix an abode anytime soon. I have a record to write, after all. It must be said though, I am very lucky to have a few understanding people surrounding me so that when it gets too much for my brain there is a sofa to rest my crooked self down upon. Bless those few.
Many of your lyrics seem quite oblique, yet on occasion you’re happy to explain what the songs are about at your gigs. Do you relish the ambiguity – I’m thinking of your description of yourself a couple of years ago as “a self-absorbed prick who wants to confuse people” – or would you rather be clearly understood?
Still a self-absorbed prick I’m afraid, though this new body of work is unlike anything else I have done – though don’t expect a dazzling disco record and there’ll be no costume changes either, though when the millions roll in who knows?
Seriously though, the movement I talk of is subtle, though the scent strong. In previous works I have felt – perhaps through insecurity – that I must cover my subject and songs with lyrics layered heavily in cryptic analogies and puzzling nonsense. I am trying for simplicity. My subject is one of loss, love and lust and these are three particulars that everyone must experience, so therefore this record will have to be clear and concise and available to everyone regardless of their age, intellect or musical preference. I am digging deeper than ever this time and the results shall have to be completely honest if they are to reach into people and sit as I intend them to be sat.
You don’t tend to address political issues directly in your songs, but nevertheless you cover politics tangentially (references to the left and right-wing in “Staghead & Monster”, or the “rivers of blood” and subversion of racial stereotypes in “Ode To Fucking Everyone”, for example). Are you actively interested in politics?
I am interested in the politics between me and you, her and him, us and them. Everything else stems outward from these simple partnerships and in my opinion loses effectiveness and certainty as it does. Perhaps I’m just too dumb to understand actual politics, probably. Just seems to me like great thinkers invest their efforts in creating philosophical ideas and revolutionary theories only to have complete idiots take them off the paper and try to apply – no sorry, force – them into actual fact. I resign back to the book and will ignore that idiot unless I get the chance to grab him by the balls and stick my filthy tongue down his throat.
There seems to be a hugely anti-authoritarian streak running through your material. You’re not very keen on institutionalised figures of authority, railing against priests, politicians, the “hypocrites’ curriculum” and even the fire brigade. Have you had many direct experiences that have contributed to this viewpoint?
It is true that my viewpoint toward authority figures and organised institutions is perhaps not met with optimism and delight. I am of Catholic upbringing and influenced by the ethics of punk rock entirely. I hate the curriculum because I believe it starves the teacher of his/her right to teach. So many good people have grown up believing they are stupid when the fact is, there simply wasn’t the correct structure in place to teach them properly. True teaching is something that comes from the heart, a heart of experience and understanding.
In the big bad world, life is life and it remains sadly unchanged, though its scale has ballooned and the space for lies to congest and persuade truth has grown wider than ever. It has been well documented by others that fear is a valuable tool and these invisible bastards will always use it to coerce and control everyone who falls under their iron might wing.
I consider it a test nowadays. Having gotten myself in a few bits of trouble I now try to fight with a form as cunning as they, rather than with fists and four letter words spitting quick out my mouth. In truth, I crave for an understanding of others and through them hopefully I will see myself and better manage to live a life full without bitterness.
I guess that avoids the question of actual experience though. Aside from the Catholic stitch in my side and a few arrests that I’ve wholly deserved, I’ve holidayed quite a few months in Medway’s local Shelley Ward in the past. Once under section and the other two occasions through necessity. All three times, heavy tranquillisation and rash diagnosis have been administered. I was told once that my song writing was a direct contributor to my ‘illness’ and that I must ‘stop chasing this idle obsession immediately’ if I ever wanted to get better, or avoid getting worse.
I ignored them. I lied to them. I fake wellness. Now I deal with any abnormal thoughts honestly and without embarrassment. Most important to me is a clear head and a good night’s sleep when I can get it. Be ready to fight when I have to and most of all to know that when the time comes I know whom I’m fighting against and exactly what for.
I get the impression that you have strong views on religion too. There are the specific references to “middle-class Christians with filth on their minds” and the “Catholic Crook” drawing on your MySpace site, as well as frequently recurring themes of fire, burning and hell in your lyrics. Are you a religious man?
Organised religion will burn for eternity in organised hell. That said, I am a deeply religious man, just a very disorganised one.
Many of your songs appear superficially dark and rather bleak, but they’re also frequently savagely funny, punctuated with an almost light-hearted wordplay and a tender kind of hope. I’ve had a stronger sense of this in 2008. Is this an under-rated element that has been there all along, or something that has emerged more recently?
I am glad you’ve noticed. Depression and desperate struggles, debt, a half hearted though continual affair with alcoholism, a dysfunctional appetite for sexstruction and a constant need for attention though complete lack of it within myself – where has it gotten me? I find myself once again crying like a fucking child, feeling sorry for the life that I am forced to lead like a drunk dog through parks built for cars, eating out of bins and wearing nappies full of shit. So I am always searching for a little light, and dearly wish it would fly by like a flutter and kiss me on the forehead right about now.
I understand that you’re no longer with Tap ‘n’ Tin Records and during your recent gigs you’ve abandoned most of the songs you’ve been playing for the last year or so in favour of almost entirely new material. What are your plans for the coming months?
Yes I have come to the end of my recording contract. Of recent gigs I wouldn’t say abandoned, rather let rest those songs for a while. I am bleeding material at the moment and enjoying the process very much. Having to perform old material would be very confusing to me, especially when I am trying to discover new ground on which to walk.
I have a small following which I am grateful for, but the big cheers come from the older and better-known songs and that I fear might subconsciously influence my new material. A clean slate is required and so recent gigs have been unorganised affairs, though for me, very important because this is all gearing up for the next record. If I have to alienate through the absence of “Lucky Six” then so be it, I couldn’t care less at the moment.
You’re very visually expressive – you share a lot of your artwork on MySpace – and you’ve also talked in the past about writing a novel. How’s that going? Would you like to broaden the scope of your output further, or have you made a decision to focus on your music for the foreseeable future?
There is a novel written, though I desperately need an editor to help me because though I could explain it front to back in under five minutes, it is structurally a very complex affair and the very thought of it gives me the shivers.
To be fair, having concentrated my efforts on songs for such a long time now, a full-length book has proved too much for my mind to contain and to complete anything you need to give it your fullest attention. I have never done that with my story so I don’t deserve it just yet.
No worries for the moment, it’s out of mind. I am content with my wandering, writing my songs and sketching people in my little black book as they pass by.
The track “Matthew’s Magpie” appears on your 2005 debut EP and was re-recorded for your final single on Tap ‘n’ Tin. It’s clearly a song that has a particular significance for you. Several of your lyrics refer to birds, but this one seems especially symbolic. Would you like to elaborate?
Matthew’s Magpie is what I would call a host song. This is a true-life tale and its origins lie around the same time I discovered my role-play partner Lupen Crook. The damned bird followed me for a whole day in the mid-summer sun around Victoria Gardens in Chatham. Despite my efforts to shoo the bird away, it stubbornly sat on the shoulders of my shadow as if whispering in the ear.
Some sort of message, though to this day the words remain unclear. So I didn’t ever work out what that message was, but a new obsession grew from that day and this song is probably the only clarification of Lupen Crook’s birthplace and his future intentions.
Thus we end where we began, with the emergence of Lupen Crook from his shadowy progenitor. Does this artifice of personality imply any lack of substance or authenticity in the music? I don’t think so. It takes a certain kind of bravery to abandon the certainties of a former identity; not to mention a considerable level of talent to be able to sum up your experiences and conclusions so honestly, in an art form frequently hijacked by the trite and the banal.
Lupen Crook continues to fascinate his many fans because he offers nothing more or less than a complete dedication to exploring who he is and what he feels about the world around him. To call this self-obsessed or narcissistic would be to miss the point: that in doing so, he encourages his audience to take the same perspective on their own lives. If that isn’t art of the highest order, I don’t know what is.
This interview was conducted in June and originally published in DrunkenWerewolf issue 5 in October. DrunkenWerewolf is published bi-monthly and covers new and unusual acts who operate in a roughly acoustic/indie/experimental vein.