Burke Shelley

John Burke Shelley (born 10 April 1950) is a Welsh bass guitarist and vocalist of the Welsh rock band Budgie. He was born in Tiger Bay, now known as Cardiff Bay, in Cardiff.

Burke Shelley
Background information
Birth name	John Burke Shelley
Born	(1950-04-10) 10 April 1950 Llanishen, Cardiff, Wales
Genres	Hard rock heavy metal
Occupation(s)	Musician singer-songwriter
Instruments	Bass vocals keyboards guitar
Years active	1967–present
Associated acts	Budgie

Music career

Shelley is often compared to Rush bassist/vocalist Geddy Lee,[1] as they both share the position of bassist/vocalist in power trio bands, both have distinctive high pitched singing voices, and during the mid to late 1970s they bore a striking resemblance to one other, with long straight hair and huge glasses. Like Lee, Shelley possessed a high tenor vocal range.[2] In addition to singing and playing bass for the group, Shelley also performed keyboards on its early albums, most notably Mellotron on "Young is a World" from their second album Squawk.

Budgie's November 2010 tour of Eastern Europe had to be cancelled as Shelley was hospitalised on 9 November in Wejherowo, Poland, with a 6 cm aortic aneurysm. After surgery, he returned to Britain for recovery, but no decision about the future of the band has been made.[3] Shelley has said that following the operation he finds it hard to simultaneously sing and play bass guitar for long periods. Nevertheless, he continues to play bass (with occasional backing vocal duties) in rock and pop covers bands based in South Wales.

Personal life

Shelley is a Christian.[4] In a 2010 interview for the BBC documentary Heavy Metal Britannia, Shelley expressed his Christian beliefs and said he'd always been uncomfortable with the occult-themed lyrics of bands such as Black Sabbath.[5]

References

1. "Biography of Budgie". Retrieved 25 August 2013.
2. "Burke Shelley". Retrieved 25 August 2013.
3. Shelley, Burke. "Latest update 20 November". Budgie.uk. Archived from the original on 15 December 2010. Retrieved 11 December 2010.
4. AllMusic
5. Shelley: "The aim is always at Christ... Christianity. That's what it's always at. You know, Judas Priest, Black Sabbath, and all the rest of them, you know... the names are all fiddling around with... to sound menacing. I'm a Christian, so I don't want to mess with anything like that, you know...cause I read in the Bible it's a bad thing, you know... to mess around with anything."