We spoke to the influencer who made THAT pub TikTok and he doesn’t care what you think

If there’s one thing we take seriously in Britain, it’s pub culture. And unless you’ve been trying to reduce your screen time this week, there’s an abnormally high chance you’ve seen this video of five guys having a few Guinness outside The Blue Posts in Soho to the chilled autumnal soundtrack of Dusty Springfield’s Spooky.

The video, made by influencer Max Lepage-Keefe, has gone viral for all the wrong reasons. Essentially, it’s made everyone notably riled: “Alright chaps don’t mind me just setting up this camera to film our chat like all the normal people do, don’t block me out the frame,” wrote one person. “Nightmare pint rotation,” added another. “No offence mate but it just looks like a cosplay of the 20th century working class.”

Firstly, for the actual context behind the video, Max was out for birthday drinks with other TikTok creator friends, including Gustavo Piers Milton (70.1k Instagram followers) and Batt Maillie (16.5k TikTok followers)— they’re all dripping in vintage clothes in a way that’s made everyone suspect they’d say “rah where’s my baccy” and vote for the Conservatives.

But Max claims that’s not the case: “I’ve had people commenting saying that I’ve got a trust fund. I wish I did,” he says. “I’m not a Tory, I work two jobs…I didn’t say a word in this video and it’s rattled so many people. I love the pub and I like dressing how I want to dress. So, just combine the two with a pint and it’s all right!” 

One of the biggest critiques of Max’s video was the way him and his friends were “pretending” to talk and laugh, while glaringly aware there was a camera on them. “One of my other friends was already filming so I thought I may as well set up my phone too,” says Max. “You feel it’s there for maybe the first 30 seconds…I was filming for about 10 minutes altogether. Then I just edited it down.” So, allegedly, little to no posing.

Many people on TikTok and Twitter have compared the bizarrely viral reaction to Max’s fairly innocent pub video to the Fitzroy Garage Sesh saga last year, where a group of Aussie boys were totally hounded after filming themselves drinking together because the internet deemed the vibes were off at their little party:

“I think it is a toxic masculinity thing,” says Max of the internet shitting all over men having a good time in a way we’d used to be seeing from TikTok girlies at brunch. “If one singular video with no words said annoys you that much it’s pretty sad…Everyone’s got an opinion and they’re free to say what they want to say…It’s spurring me on.”

At the time of writing, Max’s video of him and friends doing no more than drinking a pint has over 1.7million views and 91.5k likes. It’s been duetted by people across the UK, America and Germany. So, above anything, he wants to thank the haters for his success: “You’ve done me a favour at the end of the day,” says Max. “I’m sure you’ll see another video and I’ll fuck off the half of the country again!” 

Related stories recommended by this writer:

• ‘The best self-made dancer ever’: How Olly Bowman became the luckiest man on TikTok

• Sylvanian Drama: We met the 21-year-old creator behind everyone’s favourite TikTok account

• The story behind the woman yelling at the cat meme is actually pretty dark