CD Reviews

Father Murphy | ... And He Told Us To Turn to the Sun

Aagoo (2009)

By DEVIN KING | July 29, 2009

4.0 Stars

Harking back to an America where one's own lonely voice was the only radio and a BBQ meant a spit in the middle of the desert, Torino's Father Murphy hide detuned industrial textures within stripped-down, spacy folk instrumentation, like a man in a black hat picking up a bullet-riddled guitar with which to serenade his captives. This release suggests the unironic darkness of Nick Cave or Michael Gira, and like these two, Murphy know when to dip into more-consonant chord progressions.

Extended dabblings in this vein make the return to Reverend Freddie Murphy's Cobain-esque sneer sound that much more nefarious. This trio are into some end-of-days shit: "At That Time I Guess We Misunderstood" concludes with a call and response reminiscent of Devo: "Are we evil?/We are evil!" That would be hilarious if it weren't so damning.

It ends a three-minute song that moves among Chiara Lee's whispering choir-girl chants, Murphy's voice sent through distortion, sacrificial bass drum thumps, and antagonizing guitar. The album also moves through shadowy moods — here organ dirges, there Morricone guitars. Hell on the prairie never sounded better.

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ARTICLES BY DEVIN KING

FATHER MURPHY | ... AND HE TOLD US TO TURN TO THE SUN | July 29, 2009
Harking back to an America where one's own lonely voice was the only radio and a BBQ meant a spit in the middle of the desert, Torino's Father Murphy hide detuned industrial textures within stripped-down, spacy folk instrumentation, like a man in a black hat picking up a bullet-riddled guitar with which to serenade his captives.

SOUNDCARRIERS | HARMONIUM | May 27, 2009
The first album from this Nottingham-based band is California dippy: whispered female/male harmonies, slack flutes, swinging drums, comping Hammond organs, and a bass player who finds basic funk riffs in every progression.

THE MOVING PICTURES | May 12, 2009
If one way that bands tie themselves to the past is through sonic reference — Fleet Foxes calling forth Crosby, Stills and Nash, or Animal Collective channeling the Grateful Dead — then there's been a number of bands who tie themselves to the past through cultural reference.

VARIOUS ARTISTS | OPEN STRINGS: 1920S MIDDLE EASTERN RECORDINGS | May 06, 2009
Over the past year, Honest Jon's has released three compilations culled from more than 150,000 78s of early music from the EMI Hayes Archive: music from 1930s Baghdad, early West African music recorded in Britain, and a more general compilation that moved across country lines and the first half of the 20th century.

PAPERCUTS | YOU CAN HAVE WHAT YOU WANT | April 14, 2009
Hidden under reverb and aggressive analog production, the first sung lyrics on You Can Have What You Want belie what seems to be a cheery record title: "Once we walked in the sunlight three years ago this July."