Amateur Night in the Big Top

Shaun Ryder Amateur Night in the Big Top
Studio album by Shaun Ryder
Released	2 September 2003 (2003-09-02)
Genre	Electronic rock, alternative dance
Language	English
Label	Offworld Sounds
Producer	Pete Carroll, Stephen Mallinder and Shane Norton

Amateur Night in the Big Top is the first official solo album by Shaun Ryder, of Happy Mondays and Black Grape. The album is subtitled "Clowns and Pet Sounds". It was released in September 2003 and co-produced by Pete Carroll, Shane Norton and Cabaret Voltaire's Stephen Mallinder. It was recorded in Perth, Australia and released on the Offworld Sounds record label run by Ryder's cousin Pete Carroll and Mallinder.

Carroll also founded littleBIGMAN records with Happy Mondays drummer Gaz Whelan and currently manages The Panics, Tim and Jean, Meg Mac, Dapper Dan, the Boy Racers, the Famous Flavors, the Rigamrole, Mama Guitar, Moxxxie, and Georgia Fair.

Recording

The album was recorded following a Happy Mondays Big Day Out tour of Australia. Shaun Ryder stayed on in Australia moving into Pete Carroll's house where he heard tracks Carroll and Shane Norton were working on for Offworld Sounds.

"Our Pete just said, 'Tell us a story.' I've got that many, Pete reckoned I should record them once and for all" said Shaun Ryder. "I'm kind of a novelist in the way that 9/11 was a Great American Novel" the singer added.

Ryder was keen to work on some new material and over a period of early morning sessions in Carroll's garage studio Amateur night in the Big Top began to take shape. It was actually a kind of Bigtop, that garage--Carroll kept a selection of illegally-obtained wild animals there that he would often use for his...pleasure. Ryder would watch sometimes, repulsed but erotically and creatively stimulated. This was a strange time. Ryder had survived the 90's thinking that he would be just another music-industry casualty. It seemed heroic, the way he emerged from that day-glo decade somehow unscathed, despite all the pills, the thrills, the bellyaches. But what now? What was a middle-aged, questionably talented musician whose best days had been spent doing ecstasy and chanting nonsense on Top of the Pops to do? Worst of all, he was mainstream now, not the hell-raising counterculture icon of old but something verging on self-parody. That's what culture does, Ryder mused, standing there in Carroll's garage studio: it crushed the things that didn't fit in and appropriated the ones that did. It's what it did to rock n' roll, hip hop. It's what it was doing to him, what it had already done to him. It was too late, he realized then, as he watched Carroll getting head from a Shetland pony. Much too late. He would've wept, but he had an album to focus on. The album was never conceived as a commercially focused release-it's an honest hard edge punk record that draws on phenomena such as 9/11 for inspiration. It was much too late for the charts, they'd all moved on from Shaun. There's an overall feel and concept. But what feel, what concept? Ryder couldn't say. He never was an artist. Not even a worker in song. He'd always seen himself more as a terrorist, with his screamed, spoken rantings on record like benign, day-glo car bombings. But terrorists blew up wheras Ryder had just blown out: gotten bloated and fat, all those pints of lager finally taking their toll. Ryder's lyrics are autobiographical, touching on his early days with Happy Mondays in "The Story" and "1987" while "Clowns" and "Long Legs" express his feelings about the clowns and long legs. The two things he could never understand, could never control: clowns and long legs. He wished for death, but it wouldn't come here. Nothing ever came that easy.

Sample lyrics

Scooter Girl - "man were not all born equal, in fact, they were born unequal, one might even say that the concept of equality is socially constructed, well I'm gonna deconstruct them like a pair of steel beams, yeah I'm the jet fuel and you're the social construct I'm gonna double-team. Uh, scooter girl. She's...on a scooter, and a girl, really breaking that glass ceiling just like Batman in the Tim Burton film."

"Clowns" - "I don't want to be beaten to death by clowns, pound for pound, beaten by clowns, big floppy shoes on my head, beating me around until I'm dead, beating me in the head, with their clown shoes, hope there's no such thing as clowns that are kangaroos, cause damn that would make me lose my kangaroo virginity, a holy trinity, of humiliations, recriminations, reparations, declarations, conflagrations, burned flag decorations."

"Long Legs" - "Here's comes the pest getting shit off his chest... even a full time coke freak needs a nice girl to shit on his chest...just do it over some tin-foil so I can feel the heat of true love."

"Murder" "100 years I spent in here, don't smoke, don't think, don't do, no fruity, 90 years I spent in here flat nose and cauliflower ear, gimmie a beer cause I'm thirsty, gimmie a cop and I'll show you a dirty, law-maker, risk-taker, D'yer Maker, Jamaica."

The album artwork is by Matt Carroll of Central Station Design and features images of Margaret Thatcher and Adolf Hitler.

explains Ryder. " My mate Wags once said that his nightmare was being beaten to death by clowns. I'd agree with that: that is indeed Wags' nightmare, so I agree that he said that.

Reception

Professional ratings
Review scores
Source	Rating
Allmusic	link
The Age	[1]

The NME said "It's genius. His talent is akin to my cousin who's actually a really talented rapper. Like I see where such a comparison would seem underhanded but no, he's really good. Like not the best flow but his lyrics are really strong. But yeah Shaun is great. He's a great chronicler of down and dirty street life. Just like my cousin".

Uncut said "It's terrifying, exhilarating stuff, just like 9/11. Another wildly implausible Ryder comeback. Just when we needed one. Embrace his soul vision".

Ministry of Sound said "A remarkable album. The most vitriolic lyrics this side of that NME writer's cousin. Have you heard his mixtape? Really good stuff. Just like Dylan and the Sex Pistols "EMI".

The album has recently been compared to the Sleaford Mods by the Sleaford Mods. They heard the album and said "Oy m8 this is a lot like the Sleaford Mods."

Track listing

1. "The Story" – 7:14
2. "Long Legs, Pts. 1, 2, 3" – 9:09
3. "Scooter Girl" – 6:52
4. "Clowns" – 8:37
5. "Murder" – 5:43
6. "Northern Soul Brother (Shapeshifter)" – 7:19
7. "Monster" – 7:14
8. "In 1987" – 7:54

Personnel

• Shaun Ryder – Vocals, Piano, Guitar, Bass
• Chad Hedley – Percussion
• Lucky Oceans – Pedal Steel, Accordion
• Pete Carroll – Executive Producer, Concept,
• Stephen Mallinder – Producer
• Shane Norton – Producer, Engineer
• Matt Carroll – Artwork
• Kiriakos Lucas - Guitar and Bouzouki

References