Róisín Murphy fixes your life
- Text by Huck
- Photography by Adrian Samson
A version of this story appears in Huck 74: The Action Issue. Get your copy now, or subscribe to make sure you never miss another issue.
Since launching her career as Moloko’s frontwoman in the ’90s, Róisín Murphy has been consistently delivering euphoric disco floor fillers. Her latest and fifth solo studio album, Róisín Machine, is an impeccable array of hedonistic club anthems, paying testament to a singer who is forever evolving.
With a career now spanning three decades, Róisín has certainly acquired her fair share of wisdom and self-knowledge. So, in a column taken from the latest issue of Huck, we asked Róisín to be our agony aunt and let readers pick her brains on everything from houseplants to partying solo in lockdown.
Below, she lends a listening ear to those readers in need of advice.
—
Is it too late to learn how to dance? – Maisie
No! You don’t even have to learn, all you have to do is move. My boyfriend thinks he’s the best dancer – when he gets going, he thinks he’s John Travolta. And as long as no one tells him, that’s what he is. You can learn if you want, polish it off and whatnot, but I know I certainly can’t learn dance moves. I’m an absolute calamity, I don’t know my left from my right. But I make it up as I go along, and it’s worked so far for me. So why not for you?
Help me settle a debate. Who wins in a fight: an unassuming lion, or a modest gorilla? – Liam
100 per cent a modest gorilla. Because an unassuming lion, he’s not going to assume that there’s any danger, so he’s fucked to start with. Whereas modesty is helpful in any endeavour. So I can see that the modest gorilla would do very well. An unassuming lion is more attractive, though. If we’re going all beastiality, lions are kind of sexy, aren’t they? I love the big face and the hair, and the eyes, oh my god! Maul me! Go on, maul me! Yeah… the gorilla is definitely going to win, though.
I kill every single houseplant I come into contact with. My boyfriend thinks that I can be saved, so he continues buying them for me. But lo and behold, be it days, weeks, months, they always die hard. I want to tell him that it’s unethical for him to keep placing these poor things in my care, angel of death that I am. But I am worried he will think I am cruel and icy. Help! – Leanne
He’s bringing in the plants and he’s poisoning them. It’s part of some elaborate plan to dislodge you from reality. My advice is to never marry him. There’s something fishy going on here. Have you seen that film The Servant? He sounds a little bit Dirk Bogarde. He’s Borgarding you.
What’s love got to do with? – Phelan
Everything. Every little thing. It makes it worth living, doesn’t it? Otherwise it would just be survival, and we’re too complicated for that. It would be so boring! Everything we do, we do for love. It is our fate, I’m afraid, to live for love.
I miss being in a tight, sweaty room with 80 other people, my favourite tunes playing, my mates beside me, on our way up together at around 11.30pm, the flashing lights hitting our faces in a way that makes our gestures and expressions luminous. How can I recreate this feeling in my one-bedroom flat? – Nala
I’ve been going to micro parties over the summer. I actually DJ-ed for two people the other night. Oh my god, we were dancing all night! Well, we spent some of it lying down, because we went a bit cosmic at the end, but it was the best party I’ve been at in ages. So I would say keep dancing. I dance round the park. Off I go, in my anorak, headphones in. Start off with a light jog, then start stretching out the legs. The best stretches are… what’s it called, when you move and stretch? I can’t remember, it’s got a name. But they’ve proved that’s the best way. So go out into the country, run away, down a lane, up the pasture, and just start dancing!
Get your copy of Huck 74 now, or subscribe to make sure you never miss another issue.
Róisín Murphy’s new album, Róisín Machine, is out now on Skint Records.
Enjoyed this article? Like Huck on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.
You might like
Lost photos from the heyday of punk and new wave
Crash Bang — DB Burkeman’s latest photobook unearths photographs from his younger years as an aspiring music photographer, which sat undeveloped in his family home for decades.
Written by: Miss Rosen
Analogue Appreciation: Xmunashe
Make Yourself At Home — In an ever more digital, online world, we ask our favourite artists about their most cherished pieces of physical culture. Today, it’s elusive freeform explorer Xmunashe.
Written by: xmunashe
“Magazines are cultural artefacts”: magCulture’s Jeremy Leslie on the enduring importance of print
We love magazines — Despite the ever creeping digitalisation of the world and culture, physical objects are taking on different, yet vital, roles in culture today. Ella Glossop chats to one of London’s biggest proponents of the art about why we need to support independent publications.
Written by: Ella Glossop
Grainy, yearning memories of Europe’s ’90s free rave heyday
Never Alone — A new photobook from Cheyenne Clementi and Valentina Morandi presents pictures they made over seven years while touring the continent as part of the Tekno Mobil Squad soundsystem crew. It archives parties, people and a lifestyle largely consigned to the past.
Written by: Isaac Muk
As Hanoi’s nightlife faces raids & repression, its underground scene modulates
Spaces Between the Beats — Tensions between nightlife and authorities have grown in recent times, as police target venues and their patrons with increasingly frequent drug testing and searches. With clubs becoming hostile spaces as a result, Hanoi’s electronic music community is finding new spaces and forms of expression, reports Martin Guttridge-Hewitt.
Written by: Martin Guttridge-Hewitt
American Football: The One With The Feelings
Many moons — The Midwest emo architects transformed a college experiment into a coming-of-age soundtrack. 25 years on, their latest iteration sees them bottle the same magic for the ups and downs of middle life.
Written by: Tracy Kawalik
