I’m invoking therein
The cannibal sin
The pretenders apart
Sucked up super smart
With cool cat chagrin
Peter Murphy charismatically struts in once again with grand panache on his new single, The Artroom Wonder: a brash, bouncing burst of noir electro-pop ecstasy that swaps his dark romantic brooding for a blitz of bright beats and synth-laced swagger. With TOOL’s Justin Chancellor laying down basslines as slick as oil on glass, Murphy ditches dirge for dancefloor, serving a four-on-the-floor feast that struts perilously close to disco’s decadent domain.
Lyrically, it’s a kaleidoscopic cavalcade of clashing characters: televised charlatans, pious prophets, conniving con artists – all circling the cryptic core of the “artroom wonder.” The track tumbles through sacred rites and secular scams, spiritual invocations and consumerist cannibalism, skewering the spectacle of modern life with a sly grin. Art here isn’t salvation…it’s seduction, subversion, and spectacle, splattered on the canvas of contemporary culture.
Murphy celebrates creation as confrontation; a carnival of colour, chaos, and cunning. This is invocation; a ritual of rhythm and raw energy, channeling joy through the jittery jolt of inspiration. The Artroom Wonder slaps, struts, and smirks…a kinetic kick in the teeth to stagnation, and a reminder that sometimes salvation comes with a backbeat.
“The Artwoom Wonder is an echo from my fourth year at senior school,” says Murphy. “Daniel Ash and I are listening to the mysterious sixth-year cool intelligentsia that have gathered in the artroom. We have dared to enter their conclave, and the music coming from it was intriguing. We discover that the song being played is The Bewlay Brothers, highly intelligent, mystical and sensual, with the singer’s voice as seductive as anyone I’d ever heard…(It) has a surreal approach, telling the story in my typical oblique style, including the description of a lowdown that leads into an evocation of the perfected human being, the Prophet Muhammad (may peace be upon him). The final verse celebrates my own self-advancing and position on this.”
We can’t help but love and appreciate a David Bowie fanboy moment.
Silver Shade, Peter Murphy’s forthcoming new album, arrives May 9th via Metropolis Entertainment. The album was produced by Youth (Killing Joke, Faith No More, Alien Sex Fiend, Siouxsie and the Banshees), a partnership steeped in reverence for the raw and the reckless. Murphy calls Silver Shade “as powerful as anything he’s done,” no small boast from a man who once sang the world into darkness while hanging upside down like a bat.
You can pre-order the album, which will be released via Metropolis Records on 2xLP (with colour variants), CD, and digital formats, here.
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