Wednesday 15 March 2023

Robert Ridley-Shackleton – "Shut Up Egg" (Self-Released C-30) 2011

The absurdist prince of cardboard funk has less lovely Eggs to poach here which makes The Lovely Eggs themselves sound like Pat Methany in comparison.
Zero-fi and child-like,you will be forgiven in thinking that this was a clandestine recording made at the music therapy day-center for Kidults with learning difficulties.
Is this Outsider Art? Or a neo-Dadaist approach to sound collage,inspired by  Huge-o Balls.
No prizes for guessing that RRS is yet another demented Bristolian trying to eliminate the shame of being in the home town of Massive Attack. Maybe these extremely dull Trip Hoppers are represented by the Egg,as we ALL would like them to shut up,.....permanent like!
Presenting an image not unlike a member of the Red Hot Chilli Peppers gone even more wrong, with a degenerative wasting disease. RRS is the latest in a long line of completely mental musical eccentrics that Britain seems to effortlessly produce with considerable ease.
He either can't get a Girlfriend, or he has a Girlfriend...either way,he's Fucked, or not fucked?! Trapped in vicious circular mental torture specific to heterosexual males that lead to a special kind of beta-male torture like this. Make a cassette called Shut Up Egg or just...well....Give Up.Not something British Legend,and RRS namesake, Earnest Shackleton ever considered during his incredible escape from certain death in the antarctic,almost single handedly saving his crew from a slow death on Elephant Island in the south Atlantic.....maybe RRS is a distant relative,which would explain why he behaves as if he is still stranded on a small rocky outcrop in the antarctic hinterland,surviving on a diet of Penguins and piss.
 
RRS...Not an outsider? and definitely NOT in the Red Hot Chilli Peppers?

With a production rate that puts Jandek in the shade, you can part with some of your hard earned spondulicks at his Bandcamp site for dozens of one take madnesses spread over several formats for around three english pounds a go. A cheaper way of spending time that you will never get back I would be struggling to imagine.

Tracklist:

A1 Shut Up Egg
A2 Coconut Bird Crazy
A3 Flabjack
B1 Silly Little Poochie
B2 Poor Old Humpty