Peter Murphy - The Artroom Wonder
Having issued ‘Let The Flowers Grow’ (a surprise duet with Boy George) as a standalone single in late 2024, original post-punk icon Peter Murphy followed it in mid-February with ‘Swoon’, a majestic slice of synth-punk/funk that also served as a perfect Valentine’s Day gift for his fans.
‘The Artroom Wonder’ is available as a brand new single from today (21st March), with Murphy explaining its genesis as “an echo from my 4th year at senior school. Daniel Ash [former Bauhaus bandmate] and I are listening to the mysterious 6th year cool intelligentsia that have gathered in the artroom. We have dared to enter their conclave, and the music coming from it is intriguing. We discover that the song being played is [David Bowie’s] ‘The Bewlay Brothers’, highly intelligent, mystical and sensual, with the singer’s voice as seductive as anyone I’d ever heard."
Describing his own song, he continues: "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.”
Justin Chancellor of Tool plays bass guitar on ‘The Artroom Wonder’, one of several guest musicians on Murphy’s new album ‘Silver Shade’, which is scheduled for release on 9th May 2025 via Metropolis Records on 2xLP (with colour variants), CD and digitally. Containing both ‘Swoon’ and ‘The Artroom Wonder’, the physical and Bandcamp digital formats will also include ‘Let The Flowers Grow’ as a bonus track.
Produced by Youth (Pink Floyd, The Verve, Crowded House, as well as a member of Killing Joke, The Orb, The Firemen) at his studio in Spain, ‘Silver Shade’ is Murphy’s tenth studio album and a long-awaited follow-up to ‘Lion’, which the pair worked on together a decade ago. A symbiotic relationship born of artistic collaboration, Murphy states that “this new album is as powerful as any of my work to date.”
Peter Murphy’s solo career began in 1986 with the release of ‘Should The World Fail To Fall Apart’, with this and his eight other studio albums to date spawning fan favourites such as ‘Cuts You Up’, ‘A Strange Kind Of Love’, ‘All Night Long’, ‘Indigo Eyes’, ‘The Prince & Old Lady Shade’ and ‘I’ll Fall With Your Knife’.
Prior to this, Murphy had fronted Bauhaus, who emerged from the fertile UK post-punk scene in 1979 with the release of their debut single, ‘Bela Lugosi’s Dead’, often considered to be the very first gothic rock record. The band went on to record four seminal albums before initially splitting in 1983, as well as further classic singles such as ‘Dark Entries’, ‘The Passion Of Lovers’, ‘Lagartija Nick’ and ‘She's In Parties’. They also had a UK Top 20 hit with a cover version of ‘Ziggy Stardust’.
