Released in 2021 via Winspear, Major Murphy‘s Access felt in many ways like an inflection point in the band’s work. It was an album in the traditional sense, crafted with care as a complete entity, intended to be experienced front to back, and one which seemed to exist outside of any clear reference point. Seventies soft rock met nineties indie, heaviness shared space with a kind of leavened warmth. “In nine songs, [Access] somehow takes a listener backwards and forwards at once,” wrote Katie Crutchfield in the album description, “reckoning with intrinsic anxieties while conceptualizing a fantastical and vibrant happening, soothing in its familiar, occasionally childlike tone.”
Fallout, the new full-length from Major Murphy, emerges from where Access left off. As though having realised such a singular sound, the Grand Rapids outfit came to feel a newfound freedom in their work. The follow-up not a daunting prospect, but one of significant possibility. The combination of retro and contemporary sensibilities is again a notable feature, as highlighted by single ‘Time Out’. A track which encapsulates the themes of ruin and renewal across the record, as well as its confident sound. “The result is something not so much overcome by the turbulence of our times but able to surf atop of it,” as we wrote in a preview, “where the pressing momentum of the drums is matched by an easy-going spirit, highlighting the band’s ability to be at once punchy and languid.”
But to choose one track to describe Fallout is to isolate a single tile of a mosaic, with Major Murphy again stitching together a patchwork of styles into a cohesive album. There’s the brooding alt rock chug of ‘Daylight’, the dawning warmth of the predominantly acoustic ‘Puzzle’, a mammoth rock number in ‘Raincloud (Under My Skin)’ with its patient escalation and ‘Water’ with its vivid orchestral arrangement and spoken word delivery. Opener ‘First Thought (Best Thought)’ could be described as a combination in itself, where the record’s intimate warmth is elevated by its indie energy in a direct invocation of the creative immediacy it celebrates.
First thought, best thought
Baby I thought we were good
Turns out the fallout follows you more than you thought it wouldIn the pale morning
When the water comes and takes you home
“Breakdown / Your whole life then start a new / That’s what all things do,” opens penultimate track, Breakdown’. The most direct voicing of the questions underpinning the record, where the ever pressing demand for life and motion collides with the apocalyptic mindset of our times. “The one thing we could live without / The trials and the doubt,” as the song continues, “We’re under the microscope / Tell me, where’s your hope come from?” If the final verse suggests an answer—”Watch the world turn for a while / Hold your head up and crack a smile / There’s something to the faith of a child / Think it over”—then closer and title track ‘Fallout’ puts the sentiment into practice. A psychedelic collage pushing well over six minutes which typifies Major Murphy’s signature blend of craft and intuition. Moody, playful, charged with the sense of both beginnings and ends. Breakdown your whole life then start a new. That’s just what all things do.
Fallout is out now via Winspear and available from the Major Murphy Bandcamp page.