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Welcome to a new edition of the Best Music of All Time newsletter!
Today’s music pick is the latest from Róisín Murphy, a quirky house record produced by DJ Koze.
Genre: Electronic, House
Label: Ninja Tune
Release Date: September 8, 2023
Vibe: 🪩
One of the downsides of consuming and appreciating is you can’t control who makes it. Standing at the center of that Venn diagram is Róisín Murphy, one of the world’s pre-eminent nu-disco divas who, earlier this year, also called trans kids “little mixed up kids” and railed against puberty blockers in a private social media moment that went viral. It’s on the heels of this ugliness that Murphy dropped her latest, Hit Parade, a quirky house record produced by DJ Koze that is as striking as it is idiosyncratic. After the success of 2020’s Róisín Machine, very little of what made that record resonate with worldwide disco fiends is immediately audible here. Instead, Murphy and Koze pile on enough stylistic left turns to make your head spin. However, while unpredictable, it’s far from a challenging or off-putting listen. Instead, it sounds like it’s coming from a deep, personal space within the major players. It’s more organic-sounding than her previous material, not less. That willingness to experiment, after several decades in the music business, is always an exciting prospect for me as a listener.
Take “Two Ways” as an example of what I’m talking about. Murphy’s vocals, at times sounding more like a folk or country outtake, ping-pong off Koze’s swollen, swaggering trap production. It ebbs and flows, slowing almost to a complete stop before picking up again and racing to the finish line. On paper, that sounds like it shouldn’t work, but when heard through a good pair of speakers or headphones, it’s utterly captivating. Other gems include “The Universe,” featuring shimmering guitars and a nursery rhyme interpolation, and “You Knew,” an epic, soulful track that sees Koze bend and chop a single sentence to dazzling effect. Despite how frequently this record serves up moments of sheer brilliance, I’m curious how much staying power it will have with listeners. Early indicators say it’ll be a redemption moment of sorts for Murphy. It may be too early to tell, but when you can turn the house music format into something approaching high art, it’s reason enough to sit up and listen.
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