RÓISÍN MURPHY

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2023/sep/07/roisin-murphy-hit-parade-review

I have some sympathy for Snapes having heard what does sound like a good album months ago but at least knock one star off!

Yeah, Laura did the best she could.

This is the third time in four years that John Boyne has tried to make nice with Glinner. Coincidentally he picked up 600 new followers for defending Murphy last week, and has a new book out soon.

As well as fighting with the Auschwitz Museum for getting the Holocaust wrong, he is so dedicated to doing his own research and thoroughly analyzing what he reads that in 2020 he included monster body parts and fantasy mushrooms in a historical novel, because he googled “how to dye clothes red” and found a Zelda video game walkthrough.

I mean I was excited for the album too because I really like Dj Koze as a producer and was interested in hearing what he could do with Roisin - and yeah I’ll probably listen to it either way - but a 5 star rating is a bit exaggerated just going by the singles released so far.

Given the Guardian's previous approach to trans rights in the past few years I would not be surprised if Snapes' rating was originally lower and an editorial decision was taken by someone above her

we don’t have to review this record

idk maybe it’s better that ppl have a conversation about it but as a queer person and a trans woman this has totally annihilated whatever pleasure i could take in her music

so like why even handwring

boyne wrote a novel about a trans teen a few years ago, which was fairly typical ignorant cis writer muddling through, didn't come across as outright malicious but still offensive and very out of touch. then he accompanied it with a very both-sides newspaper column on trans rights, rambling about how he supported trans rights but rejected the term 'cis' and he supported navratilova's transphobia but not linehan's and rightfully got a lot of shit for all that. in response to being criticised he's tripled down (as he did when criticised by the auschtwitz museum) and eventually decided actually linehan is right.

i'd been thinking this could shape up to be her best solo album but it isn't (fortunately?), merely good-not-great. some wonderful tracks ("free will" especially) but also some that don't really work with very strange processing on the vocals.

it's weird to feel glad to be a bit underwhelmed by something

"I checked!"

Well, those reports were unconfirmed by the label. They have made no official statement whatsoever and they are not intending to donate proceeds from the record to charity. I checked!

— Róisín Murphy (@roisinmurphy) September 8, 2023

How nice for her.

if I ran an acclaimed indie label with a newly outed TERF, I would simply have issued a statement from the start and said trans rights with my chest and not through a source but I do not run an acclaimed indie label so what do I know

if you want to get a feeling for how twitter is going outside your bubble then have a look at the replies and QTs on Snapes's review. and the community note they've added.

The transphobes and Hadley Freeman are losing their minds (again).

Ratings aside that was a very well handled review.

in all seriousness, I still respect Ninja Tune for what was initially reported (and I hope Roisin is wrong) but their own silence is confusing (is it for legal reasons? safety?) considering Raisin's own silence is what really escalated the situation imo

can always rely on this guy for a bad take:

Your reminder that Róisín Murphy is being vilified for comments whose substance accords with what is now accepted to be best practice by the NHS.

Yes, I'm still banging on about it. I will do so as long as that vilification continues. Because this is some bullsh*t right here. https://t.co/xwyxKZhoVV

— (((David Bennun))) (@DavidBennun) September 8, 2023

Lots of TERF love-bombing as usual.

The quote-tweets on her ‘I checked..’ comment tell a far more interesting story. Mostly probably because TERFs don’t know how to use quote-tweets.

Big 'we get as many complaints from one side as the other' outcome for the Graun

Which is interesting in itself considering TERFs say ‘99.9% of people’ agree with them.

Do they also say they have the backing of "the silent majority"?

Freeman snidely side sniping at Snapes is it

You're in for a rude awakening when the wave of performative support from the worst people on the planet you are currently enjoying for being an open bigot ends and you realize you destroyed your career. And for what? To make queer people's lives harder? Embarrassing.

— André (@jygglypuffdadTV) September 8, 2023

she liked a tweet criticising boyne for apologising to linehan so who knows what the hell she's thinking lol. using twitter again can't possibly help her though

be mad if someone had stripped all the vocals and just had a wicked DJ Koze record to listen to wouldn't it. pic.twitter.com/OiVgcGOw5j

— bloatyhead (@bloatyhead) September 8, 2023

yes please re: instrumental release

I'm not on twitter anymore so I can't see what she responded to, but has it turned out that Ninja Tune is not donating to charity and not actually dropping her?

The story about Ninja Tune donating all proceeds came from "a source familiar with the matter told the Star on background" not from the label itself.

at the very least, Ninja Tune is definitely not publicizing her at all.

It sounds like Murphy checked with them and found it isn't true. If you believe her.

Well, those reports were unconfirmed by the label. They have made no official statement whatsoever and they are not intending to donate proceeds from the record to charity. I checked!

— Róisín Murphy (@roisinmurphy) September 8, 2023

I do feel bad for the producers who worked hard on this (is Koze the sole producer?). My most streamed piece of music by a wide margin was for a rapper who later got (rightfully) canceled. :/

never seen anyone implicitly so happy to learn a charity *wouldn't* be getting money

She’ll be donating any earnings she makes to The Human Fund

Ok gave this one a chance and trying to hear separating the art from the artist:

There’s no way this is a 5 star album even removed from the current controversy. Way too long, with a lot of songs that don’t do anything particularly interesting. Couple of highlights sure but this is at most a 3.5 star album imho.

And yeah most interesting things are what DJ Koze is cooking in the background but it wouldn’t work as an instrumental either.

(is Koze the sole producer?)

Yes, she's returned to the original model of doing each album with a single also-makes-their-own-records producer. (Parrot on Roisin Machine and Fulton on the 2018 albumsworth-of-EPs.) (There was also a Mad Professor collab in progress, but he has two co-write credits on Hit Parade, so maybe that stalled out and she salvaged parts of songs.)

A student at the radio station forwarded me the streamable link, so I felt no guilt about giving her royalties in the last couple days, and...it's fine? Certainly not at the level of Róisín Machine

idk the dennun take above is some classic "accidental ally" shit to me. "if you think murphy is a bigot, that means you also disagree with the official nhs policy on trans healthcare!" yeppers! do they say "yeppers" in the uk? they should. the uk needs to steal all of our most embarrassing slang.

signed,

an american who still likes to call things she doesn't like "naff"

Bennun's also spreading disinformation about the Cass Review. He's been doubling down on his GC stance over the past couple of years, all while presenting himself as a moderate: of course I support trans rights he claims, while pushing exclusively GC arguments and defending the likes of Helen Joyce.
I'd say Bennun was a classic aggro centrist who lost his mind over Corbyn, but he's always been like this. I've seen MM articles of his from the 90s where he sets himself up as the sensible grown up who is much wiser than some silly out group, eg a Levellers review that expends much of the word count sneering at crusties walking by his Brighton cafe while he sits sipping his cappuccino and reading the Times (he did a similar thing more recently with his Cypress Hill piece, inventing some straw man CH fan to sneer at). A lousy music writer and an even lousier political commentator.

Think we need a 77 Terfwatch thread

Done.

Hey, name me one band you always assumed were pricks despite never hearing a note of their music? Btw, Roisin Murphy was apparently the special guest at Fat White Family's gig in Brixton last night

lol fat white family's twitter likes are filled with faux-left reactionaries like nina power so that checks out lol

Fat White Family do have a previous connection: the guitarist and singer have an extensive Dean Honer collab, and in 2019 Parrot remixed and Roisin directed a video for them

her new fans have actually come through for her:

Albums Chart Update: Roisin Murphy's Hit Parade hits the Top 3 midweek https://t.co/UAfPvP4qtD pic.twitter.com/JbuEF5JVYx

— Official Charts (@officialcharts) September 11, 2023

her new fans:

Bought it!
My usual choice of music is trad folk from Donegal, but, well.... why not try something new?

— Theo Hopkins (@TheoHopkins4321) September 11, 2023

Most amusing seeing TERFs saying they’ve ‘just downloaded it on Spofity’ and such like.

I am morbidly curious to see who would work with her on her next album

It will be a collab with J.K. Rowling.

It's not exactly difficult to get albums in the UK Top 10, Morrissey does it all the time only for the album to plummet out the next week, we'll see how it goes for her album. I imagine it'll still sell reasonably well tbh.