Peter Murphy - Biography
By Scott Feemster
Though still known primarily as the vocalist and frontman for goth pioneers Bauhaus, Peter Murphy has had a wide-ranging and successful career on his own terms.
Peter John Murphy was born in the English midlands city of Northampton, and raised in a strict Catholic family of nine kids, he being the youngest. Murphy remembered first being attracted to music due to his mother’s habit of constantly humming tunes, and grew into an artistically inclined teenager, though one that was somewhat anti-social. Because of his anti-social bent, he turned down the chance to go to art college, and instead worked as printer’s assistant, while pursuing his interests in painting, writing, and singing in his free time. In 1979, an old school friend, and fellow painter, Daniel Ash, contacted Murphy about joining a band he was putting together with brothers David J. Haskins and Kevin Haskins. With Ash on guitar, David J. on bass, and Kevin Haskins on drums, Peter Murphy became the vocalist with Bauhaus. It seemed a role he was destined to play. With his high cheekbones, thin frame and penchant for the theatrical, Murphy was almost like a dark offspring of Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust and Iggy Pop. The group quickly arrived on a darkly driving post-punk sound that combined elements of glam rock, punk, dub, art-rock, heavy metal and the starkness of such other post-punk outfits as Joy Division and Public Image Limited. The group’s first release, the iconic “Bela Lugosi’s Dead”, was released on the independent Small Wonder label in 1979, and instantly became an underground dance hit. With that first song and the band’s dark demeanor, penchant for black clothes, and pale appearance, Bauhaus almost single-handedly invented the sub-genre of goth, initially consisting of their almost cult-like following of fans. The group was signed to the fledgling 4AD label in 1980, and released their first album, In The Flat Field, the same year. The album was an underground success, and the group jumped ship to the larger independent label Beggars Banquet for their next release, 1981’s Mask. By then, the band’s mix of Ash’s screaming, distorted guitar over Haskins dub-inflected drumming and David J.’s solid bass lines combined with Murphy’s darkly morose, (and sometimes, darkly humorous), vocals became a trademark, and the group found it’s following expanding exponentially. The group released a live album, Press The Eject And Give Me The Tape (Beggars Banquet), and their third studio album, The Sky’s Gone Out (Beggars Banquet) the following year. Inter-band tensions were starting to rise by the time the group began to make plans to record a fourth album. Both David J. and Ash were getting tired of writing most of the songs, but Murphy stealing most of the limelight, and so, when Murphy became seriously ill with pneumonia at the beginning of recording, the remaining three carried on without him. When Murphy was well enough to return, he was hurt that the band had only left a few songs for him to sing on, as both Ash and J. took over vocal duties for the first time. After the release of Burning From The Inside (Beggars Banquet), the group toured, but damage had been done in the band’s interpersonal relationships, and after the tour was completed, it was announced that Bauhaus would be breaking up. (Ash, J., and Haskins went on to form the successful trio Love and Rockets a few years later.)
Murphy quickly forged a new musical alliance with former Japan bassist/multi-instrumentalist Mick Karn, and the two formed the band Dali’s Car in 1984, and released one album, Waking Hour (Beggars Banquet), the same year before breaking up shortly afterward. Afterwards, Murphy took a break from his music career, and studied dance with the woman who would eventually become his wife, Beyhan Foulkes, a professional choreographer. Murphy eventually returned to music and recruited a group of studio musicians, who he eventually dubbed the Hundred Men, to record his first proper solo album, 1986’s Should The World Fail To Fall Apart (Beggars Banquet). While the album, a slightly more upbeat update on the sound he started with Bauhaus, was a success amongst Bauhaus’ followers, it failed to cross over to a bigger audience, and was never released in the United States. For Murphy’s second solo album,1988’s Love Hysteria (Beggars Banquet/RCA) he teamed up with songwriter Paul Statham, and the two wrote songs that had a slicker, more commercial sheen, while still retaining most of Murphy’s dark allure. Love Hysteria was released worldwide, and Murphy scored two hit songs with the singles “Indigo Eyes” and “All Night Long”. Murphy and Statham built upon the success of Love Hysteria with Murphy’s next album, Deep (Beggars Banquet), released in 1990. Murphy reinvented his image, dying his trademark black hair a platinum blonde, and reinvented his sound, taking on a slightly harder, alternative rock sound. Murphy scored the biggest hit of his career with the song “Cuts You Up” from the album, and the single went on have one of the longest runs at the top of the Billboard Modern Rock Tracks chart, a streak only bested later by the R.E.M. song “Losing My Religion”.
Murphy continued expanding his sound and going through life changes. In the early 1990’s, he not only got married to Foulkes, but also converted to Islam, and moved to Turkey. Murphy mixed some Middle Eastern influences with his post-Bowie modern rock sound for his next album, 1992’s Holy Smoke (Beggars Banquet/RCA). While the album was a strong collection of songs, it didn’t sell very well, especially coming on the heels of the crossover success of Deep. Murphy broke up the Hundred Men after Deep, but continued writing with Statham, and also enlisted the help of producer Pascal Gabriel and Canadian “infinite guitar” player Michael Brook for his lush and more contemplative 1995 album Cascade (Beggars Banquet/RCA). Cascade had a more mature and beautiful sound than any of Murphy’s previous albums, but it was largely ignored by the record buying public. Following Cascade, Murphy left his longtime label Beggars Banquet and finished his collaboration with Statham, as well. Murphy signed with the new major-label supported label Red Ant, (also home to his old Bauhaus bandmates in Love and Rockets), and released the Recall EP in 1997, featuring collaborations with members of KMFDM on heavily electronic versions of some of his older songs, with a couple of new songs thrown in as well. The presence of Murphy and Love and Rockets being on the same label fueled building rumors of a possible Bauhaus reunion, and even though the Red Ant label folded soon after releasing Murphy’s EP, Bauhaus did indeed reform in 1998 for a tour dubbed the Resurrection Tour. One of the stops on the tour, at New York’s Hammerstein Ballroom, was recorded and released as the live DVD Gotham (Metropolis) in 1998.
Murphy returned to his solo career in 2000, when he launched his Just For Love tour, a retrospective look at his career that featured just two backing musicians, guitarist Peter DiStefano, formerly of Porno For Pyros, and electric violinist Hugh Marsh. (Occasionally the three were also joined by David J. on bass.) A live recording of one of the shows, titled Alive Just For Love (Metropolis) was released in 2001. Murphy surprised many of his fans with his next album, 2002’s Dust (Metropolis), which paired him with Turkish musician Mercan Dede, and was heavily influenced by traditional Turkish music. Many of Murphy’s dyed-in-the-wool goth followers didn’t appreciate the album, but many of Murphy’s more progressive fans welcomed the different sound he was going after. In 2004, Murphy signed with the Viastar label, and released the album Unshattered the same year. Unshattered was a return to the more rock sound of some of his ‘90’s era albums, and Murphy assembled a new band and returned to touring in 2005, and again in 2007. In 2008, Murphy again rejoined Daniel Ash, David J. and Kevin Haskins to play a few shows as Bauhaus, and most surprisingly, the foursome returned to the studio and recorded a whole album of new material, Go Away White (Cooking Vinyl)(2008). Initially the group had planned to release the album and tour behind it, but internal tensions amongst the members reared its ugly head again, and by the time the album was released in March of 2008, the group had broken up again, presumably for the last time. At last date, Peter Murphy is reportedly working on an album for release in 2009, and has also appeared on stage with Nine Inch Nails and Trent Reznor, (an avowed Bauhaus and Murphy fan), performing a version of The Normal’s early ‘80’s electro hit “Warm Leatherette”.