Pittsburgh's The Cheats release new album — 'Old Rats on a New Ship'

The Cheats, a veteran punk band from Pittsburgh, released their latest album, “Old Rats on a New Ship,” on Friday, but it was actually the second album of originals they put together since 2020’s “Cussin’, Crying ‘N’ Carrying On.”

“We actually had a whole record done with another member, but he left,” said singer Todd Porter (aka Todd Cheat). “And after listening to it, we decided to scrap it because we got a new guy, Johnny (Razorblade), who was our record producer and recorder for the last two things we’ve done. And he usually sat in — our other guitar player was from Cleveland, so he couldn’t make a lot of the gigs. So Johnny would always fill in. So after working with Johnny and he quit his band, he wrote great songs. So let’s scrap all this stuff and start from scratch.”

The resulting album on Screaming Crow Records checks in just under 30 minutes, with the 11 songs channeling old-school punk, calling to mind bands like Social Distortion (“Stuck on You”), Bad Religion (“Control”) and Ramones (“For You”).

Porter, who owns Sinners and Saints Tattoo in Shadyside and Screaming Crow Tattoo in Homestead, said his day job offers ample inspiration for songs.

“Well, basically what we do is we listen to music all day there anyways, so you’re hearing all kinds of stuff,” said Porter, who also fronted Silver Tongued Devil and Eviction in the past. “Our shop is pretty diverse with the people that come in there. So you hear all the different stories from different walks of life and everything like that, so you just take it all in. I mean I’ve been doing it for like 30 years now.”

The Cheats — who also include Devon Holiday (guitar), Philthy Phil (bass) and Kyle Cheat (drums) — will play an album-release show Saturday at Crafthouse, with Electric Frankenstein, The Ravagers and Bottle Rat also on the bill. The group will be busy this summer, playing the 31st Street Pub reunion, opening shows for Dwarves and The Queers and more.

In a call last week, Porter discussed the album, keeping a band running for 20-plus, the changing music landscape in Pittsburgh and more:

You’ve got the new record (that came out) Friday, so what should people know about it?

Buy it. It’s a good punk rock and roll record, been working on it for about two years now.

Was it tough to scrap that (unreleased) album?

Nah, we weren’t really feeling it.

Once Johnny got involved, did the album come together pretty smoothly?

Oh, yeah yeah yeah. He’s a machine, man. (laughs)

The latest single is “Control,” so what’s the story behind that one?

We were just looking for something kind of fast and heavy. We came up with some of the lyrics and then (Razorblade) took it from there. He writes a lot of the music and some of the lyrics. So we told him what we wanted at practice, and we kind of worked it out. (laughs)

Does the music come first or is it the lyrics?

It’s usually the music. Sometimes we work with a hook or something and go from there, you kind of sing it to yourself like, oh, what can I build around this?

Do you have a bunch of lyrics sitting around?

Oh yeah, dude. I got books and books of lyrics. (laughs)

Just have to find something that fits?

Yeah, or just you keep your ear open and you hear all kinds of stuff during the day like, I gotta write that down and that was kind of cool, or that line’s cool.

What are the challenges with keeping a punk rock band going for more than 20 years?

Just keeping members, man. These guys have been hanging out. We’re all at the age now where it’s for fun, and there’s really no pressure in it anymore. But people don’t leave because they find girlfriends and stuff. We’re all married. (laughs) No more, ‘Oh, my girlfriend doesn’t want me to play in a band.’ Everybody’s been married for a while. So it’s basically your hobby. Thursday nights are when we practice. There are some nights we just get together and hang out, don’t even pick up our instruments, just sitting around and (talking). It’s more of a social thing anymore.

So more fun than a “career.”

Yeah, we forgot about that 25 years ago.

You said you’re having fun, but is it difficult to get people to commit to taking it seriously at the same level that you want it to be?

No, I mean, find the right kind of guys. We practice once a week. And we play out a lot, but if you don’t want to play out, then don’t do it. Everybody works around. We always have discussions of when we’re going to play, and there’s always a group text: Hey, we got this offer, you guys want to do this, you guys want to do that? We always try to, usually in the fall, probably take two weeks off, and we usually go on a little tour or something.

It looks like you have a bunch of shows lined up this summer. Are you going as hard now as when you were younger?

Oh, hell no. (Expletive), I used to go out for a month and a half, sleep on people’s floors, we don’t do that no more. (laughs)

You’re not sleeping on floors anymore?

Hell no, man. My back can’t take it.

Would you rather be playing a show or working on new music?

I love work. I love going in the studio, but playing live is what does it. I don’t know how many bands I know through the years that they’d just practice practice practice. We practice, but they would practice and never play out. I was always like, that’s the payoff, man. You play out. So that’s something, that’s my payoff. I love playing out.

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What did you think you’d be doing when you were in your 60s? Did you think you’d still be making music like this?

No, I didn’t think I’d do it past my 30s. (laughs) It’s weird, like I’ve been doing this for so long, it’s just nature. I don’t even think about it anymore. It’s like, oh, now we got a new record. OK, now we’re playing out live this weekend. OK, that’s cool. So it just fits in there. That’s how it is now.

What’s the audience look like for you now? Are you seeing a bunch of old punks out in the crowd? Is it younger?

It depends on the shows. Usually like a local show, we have our crowd that comes out, and then we’ll open up for a bigger band, that way you get a mix. But it’s cool because if we do that, then usually our next couple shows we get a couple new people there, the younger kids or whatever, so that’s kind of neat.

What’s your take on the Pittsburgh music scene? Is it better, worse, the same as when you first started playing?

No, it’s a lot different, man. There used to be great mid-level clubs and bigger bar clubs. Now it’s like, all the bars now, they can fit maybe 50 people in. You used to have the (31st Street) Pub where you’d get like 200 people and stuff. Plus everybody’s getting older. There’s some people that don’t want to hang out anymore. Every once in a while, you’ll see people you haven’t seen forever come out to shows. Plus we’re getting older too, so the crowd’s getting a little bit older.

It’s probably a different community. Back then you didn’t have the social media.

When I started getting into punk rock in like ‘81, ‘82, there was just one punk scene. Now it’s so splintered. You got your crust punks. You got your hardcore kids. You got your horror punk kids. Before it was just one scene. Now, it’s like, there’s, (expletive), 30, 40 different genres and sometimes those people don’t cross over to the other scenes. ‘Oh I don’t like this.’ There’s been times, we’re talking to younger kids and they’re like, ‘I don’t know. I don’t like your band.’ I’m like why don’t you like my band? ‘I don’t like your kind of punk rock.’ What kind of punk rock? I see you have Johnny Thunders pins on and (stuff) like that. ‘Oh yeah, I like that.’ Yeah, that’s what our guitar player plays, dude. Sometimes they just don’t even know. They’re just told what’s cool, what’s not cool.