Peter Murphy steps once more into the fire, his voice a blade honed by years, his presence as commanding as it ever was. The unexpected duet with Boy George from last fall was an eyebrow-raising pleasant surprise, but his latest collaboration with Trent Reznor, a catchy dark synth funk number Swoon, lands in a space he knows well: a place of menace and magnetism, where the night stretches long, the rhythm prowls, and the past never relinquishes its grasp.
Swoon slithers with synth-drenched swagger, its bassline prowling, its rhythm striking like a match. It bears the fingerprints of Reznor, an artist with whom Murphy has long shared a kindred spirit. The bond stretches back to 1990 when NIN opened for Murphy’s Deep tour; it deepened again in 2006 when Bauhaus joined Nine Inch Nails on the road and flared again in 2009 when Murphy stepped onstage with them in New York.
“I am both in the state of swoon as are my audience when witnessing my live performance,” says Murphy. “Trent Reznor cordially accepted my invitation to appear on the song, adding a welcome vibe on the second verse, as well as throughout the entire song in the form of backing vocalizing.”
Little else is known of Silver Shade, but Swoon makes one thing clear: Murphy still stalks the shadows, still commands the stage, still sings the night into something electric and alive.
Listen below:
Silver Shade, Peter Murphy’s latest offering, arrives May 9 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.
Pre-order the track here.
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