He was born Peter John Murphy on July 11, 1957 near Northampton, England, one of nine children in an Irish Catholic family. He was a fan of the glam and punk music emerging in Britain in the early to mid 1970s, but didn't seem to be striving toward becoming a musician himself.
In fact, he initially applied to attend art college, but then turned down his place in order to take a job at a print shop to bring in extra money for his family. It was only through his friendship with guitarist Daniel Ash, who along with brothers David J and Kevin Haskins was forming the band that would become Bauhaus, that Peter Murphy started out on the road that would lead him to his legendary cult status and his sometimes unwanted role as "Godfather of Goth."
The Bauhaus Years
Glam/goth outfit Bauhaus are one of the acknowledged bands at the forefront of the goth-rock movement, which grew out of punk in the late 1970s and continues today. Murphy's vampiric looks, haunting baritone, and theatrical stage presence ensured that he became an early icon of the subculture; indeed, according to Dark Entries, Ian Shirley's definitive book about the band, it was the amount of attention that Murphy drew, in detriment to the other band members, that partly contributed to Bauhaus's 1983 breakup.
Dance, Dali's Car, and the World Falls Apart
At sixes and sevens following Bauhaus's demise, Murphy dabbled in different projects, appearing in ad campaigns for Maxell and experimenting with dance on British television. His fame had caused interest from record companies eager to capitalize on a solo release, but Murphy seemed reluctant; he was not a musician per se, but a vocalist and lyricist.
In 1984, he teamed with bassist Mick Karn from new-wave band Japan; the pair released an album called The Waking Hour under the name Dali's Car. A single and accompanying video — “The Judgment is the Mirror” — was released from the album, but evidently the project was too experimental for the record-buying public, and sales were poor. Murphy decided at that point to assemble a band of session musicians and songwriters to help him with his first solo record.
Should the World Fail to Fall Apart was released in 1986. Though still retaining a hint of the darker sound expected by Bauhaus fans, the songs on the record were surprisingly bright and shimmering, here and there inflected with a slight Middle Eastern influence. The album also contained two covers, Magazine's "The Light Pours Out of Me" and Pere Ubu's "Final Solution."
The latter song made a small impact in dance clubs, but overall Should the World... did not have much commercial success. Murphy, however, was undaunted, and now more confident in his ability to craft interesting and complex pop songs. He put a more permanent band together — The Hundred Men — and set his sights on American shores.
Love Hysteria, Deep, and Massive Success
The late 1980s were undoubtedly Murphy's most commercially successful period. A 1987 tour co-headlining with The Church brought old and new fans out in droves. Collaborating with B-Movie alum Paul Statham, Murphy released Love Hysteria in March 1988. Its first single, "All Night Long," accompanied by an atmospheric black and white video, went into rotation on MTV, and the album itself earned a respectable showing on the college and independent charts.
In 1990, Murphy changed his look — from dark-haired vampire to blonde rock idol — and his sound, going for a more aggressive alt-rock approach. The formula worked; the 1990 single "Cuts You Up" went into heavy MTV rotation, and the album Deep topped the college charts for two months, climbed to number 41 on the mainstream charts, and eventually sold over half a million copies. It seemed that Murphy was poised to cross over to the mainstream.
Sources:
- Official Peter Murphy Website at: www.petermurphy.info/
- Shirley, Ian (2001). Dark Entries: Bauhaus and Beyond. SAF Publishing Ltd. ISBN: 0946719136.
- The Sweetest Drop Web Archive at: www.web.archive.org/web/20071016200535/www.sweetestdrop.org
Jenny Ashford - Jenny Ashford is a writer and graphic artist from central Florida. Her main area of interest in her Suite 101 articles is science, with a ...
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