In the years since the dissolution of her ’90s trip-hop duo Moloko, Irish singer Róisín Murphy has become one of the most dependably great dance-pop auteurs around. And today, she’s announcing a new album called Róisín Machine, the disco-house diva’s first full-length project since 2016’s Take Her Up To Monto.
Murphy recorded Róisín Machine with longtime collaborator Richard Barratt, aka DJ Parrot, aka Crooked Man. In addition to previously released singles like “Murphy’s Law,” “Incapable,” and “Narcissus,” the record will include five new tracks including “Something More,” penned by NYC songwriter Amy Douglass. As Murphy explains:
We met last year at a very interesting talk event in London about the psychology and science of Dub. We hit it off immediately, I’m afraid we may have heckled the speakers, who happened to have among them Andrew Weatherall!
I asked her to write me a song about never being full or satisfied, exponential need. She sent a very basic but brilliant demo very soon after, just her singing and playing a piano. The challenge then is to get the music-direction right, the arrangement and the voicing.
Our first version was way more straight ahead pop, funky, very camp. It seemed right when we began before lockdown but as a new reality descended upon the world we got tired of its one and only dimension. So when this slow-burn, deep, soulful, groove emerged out of the Crooked remixes, I decided to change tack. It seemed perfect, the perfect arrangement for the song and also perfect for the moment. We’re in darker ages now and this feels like morning, the sun’s coming up and it’s the last record of a very, very, good night. We need space for “mood” and the “uncanny” right now.
The song is “a swan-song to how we once lived,” according to Murphy. “There’s plenty of bravado in the lyrics and the character is a kind of antihero but the indefinable yearning and the feeling of arriving at a point of emptiness is universal right now!” Listen to the eight-minute extended mix of “Something More” below.
TRACKLIST:
01 “Simulation”
02 “Kingdom Of Ends”
03 “Something More”
04 “Shellfish Mademoiselle”
05 “Incapable”
06 “We Got Together”
07 “Murphy’s Law”
08 “Game Changer”
09 “Narcissus”
10 “Jealousy”
Róisín Machine is out 9/25 on Skint/BMG. Pre-order it here.
