Recently watching the 1974 "classic" Nude for Satan confirmed that A: Italian art can often be simultaneously Catholic and subversive and B: they make music that's fantastically fucked up. This Italian trio fire their oddball flare within the first five seconds in opener "We Were Colonists," a track stray cultists stranded at a gas station might record. Father Freddie Murphy wields a junior Beefheart delivery when the need arises, and it's nicely balanced by Chiara Lee's sweet schoolgirl-ish-ness. On "Go Sinister," they harmonize choral-style within an austere atmosphere that draws on the Italian indulgences of both opera and giallo. There are elements of Michael Gira's shabby grandeur crossed with the improvised drum racket of My Cat is an Alien. Their guitars seem infected with distortion and the percussion blends rowing rhythms with sea spray cymbals. The whole procession keeps shifting focus so that you can't be sure if they are winking or wincing.
(Boring Machines)Father Murphy
...and He told us to Turn to the Sun
BY Eric HillPublished Sep 17, 2009
