Spunge
British ska punk band

Spunge (often typeset as [spunge]) is a ska punk band from Tewkesbury, England. Through many years of touring, Spunge have toured with or played alongside a number of UK bands; and several American bands such as Green Day, Dropkick Murphys and Reel Big Fish; and been supported on a UK tour by Bowling for Soup; the latter of whom contributed backing vocals to the song "Centerfold" on the That Should Cover It! album.
In 2019 the band toured the UK supporting Reel Big Fish, playing the same set they recorded for the album Live in 'nam... (Cheltenham)
History
Pedigree Chump and Room for Abuse
Conceived in July 1994, with almost the same line up as today (the only difference being that Copeland used to double up on bass), the band went through a lengthy gestation period (adding bassist Simon Bayliss in 1995, and replacing him with Martin Holt in 1997), before emerging with the Kicking Pigeons EP in 1998. Having sold 5000 copies at pub gigs the band decided that there was enough potential to leave their day jobs, and make the band a full-time concern. Having soon gained a manager in Dave Juste of Birmingham's Xposure Rock Cafe (a regular early haunt), Spunge hit the road, and would eventually notch up well over three hundred gigs in just two years.
Less than a year later in 1999, Spunge released their début album Pedigree Chump on MoonSka Europe and thus set about introducing the band to a wider audience. Holt tired of touring, so good friend Chris Murphy joined to play bass.
Their second album Room for Abuse was recorded at DEP International Studios, and released on Sucka-Punch Records in 2000, featuring the single "Ego" plus covers of Bob Marley's "No Woman No Cry" and Sublime's "Santeria".
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Spunge” is british ska punk band. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Spunge, British and punk, not as a finished interpretation.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 21, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3494280. VIAF identifies the subject as 143483887. The Library of Congress control number is no2010093568. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2019, 1994, 1995 and 1997.
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This entry incorporates text from “Spunge” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.