Photo credits: HollyMae Steane Price

Everything is shit though this show isn’t, even though the writer performer has been through the shit show of a fucked up family.

A hit at last year’s Sydney Fringe Festival, Andy Freeborn’s raw from couch to Casio cabaret show, EVERYTHING IS SHIT moves to a late night spot at the Old Fitz in a curtain raiser to Mardi Gras.

A free wheeling free form fireside chat about childhood trauma when Catholic couple and biological parents of four split acrimoniously, EVERYTHING IS SHIT is parent blaming, parent shaming not Church bashing. 

A handful of songs, a lot of patter , a cartload of catharsis, EVERYTHING IS SHIT tracks the fallout of a dysfunctional marriage and subsequent divorce on young Andy and their siblings. Each of the sisters and his brother  are all given their own song. One appreciative if misunderstood, another creating heat for raking over old coals.

Mum, a kind of Lucy Jordan tragic, (well past thirty-seven, will she ever get to Paris?) gets a tribute tune, too, and so does Andy’s childhood backpack, affectionately known as Stephen. Or is that Steven?

The treatment of the father virtually erasing the mother from the kids’ culture is cruel and a further trigger of the trauma sustained. There’s a lot to unpack and this show thrums with songs as therapy, a show that strives for a healing quality for the performer.

Andy is aided by an eight piece support group, Austin Hall on drums, Chris Bouhabib on bass guitar, Renae Goodman on sax, Dylan Roberts on bassoon, Alec Steedman on violin, and vocalists Ren McMeiken, Jess Ramsey and Nina Carcione.

From ballads to raucous jams, EVERYTHING IS SHIT hits a bittersweet sweet spot in confessional cabaret, a hope in healing and a faith in moving on.

EVERYTHING IS SHIT plays  The Old Fitz 9pm till Friday March 1