Last year, Martha Skye Murphy released the triptych Concrete; an EP of three, icy pieces of baroque pop featuring production from FKA Twigs. Gravelly, astral, and ethereal, Concrete was as expansive as it was fleeting. Gone in just over twelve minutes, Concrete gave credence to Murphy’s skill as writer and vocalist. Within that span of time, she somehow managed to create an entire microcosm of her own, a dreary world that lingered somewhere between brutalist architecture and the romantic hysteria of Kate Bush. If Concrete was an exercise in finding stillness between time, then Distance On Ground, her new collaboration with experimental composer Maxwell Sterling, is an exercise in moving forward while staying still.
A concept piece that comprises two long form improvised compositions and accompanying video pieces for each, Distance On Ground explores the idea of travel and being in a state of flux. Murphy and Sterling find themselves fixated on how while in commute, the world around you blurs and evolves with every passing moment while your body remains still. The music follows through on this investiture, layering phrases of Murphy’s hydraid vocalisations against an ever changing landscape of swarthy bass and passages of drone synths. Things never stay constant. Under Sterling’s auteurship, it all swirls and collides into each other, amorphous yet distinct like blooming, merging watercolours. All this paints the scene of looking out the car window as the world outside zooms by, a sometimes meditative, sometimes treacherous experience where the looming danger of total annihilation is almost as certain as the destination. On 86km the vista opens with sliding strings under blankets of drones, suddenly coming into focus with Murphy’s voice calling out like a mermaid frolicking in the surf. This quality of voice continues over the course of the track’s eight minutes, at one point Sterling’s manipulation and layering of Murphy’s voice even recalling the chatter of dolphins. Phrases are slowed and reversed, melting into one another and eventually juxtaposed so that they evolve into increasingly more ominous formulas as 86km runs its course. 93.3km is more jagged still, shuddering, abysmal, and foreboding with Murphy’s voice receding in and out of the shadows like a mechanical siren.
Download Distance On Ground here
Sterling has consistently singled himself out as one of the most ambitious and distinct voices in classical music and scoring. Last year’s Turn of Phrase was beguiling, lasting long after the final harpsichord notes of SumUp sank into nothingness. With Murphy, he again brings this visionary perspective to the fore, conjuring for her a strange, fantastical world that in sound suggests a ripping of the binary between our world and an alternate dimension. This music coalesces with the mise-en-scène of the world around you, homogenising with wherever you may be experiencing it from and then skewing this place altogether. The magic happens when suddenly, you find yourself pulled out of the real world and into Distance On Ground’s dark allure.
In conjunction with the EP’s accompanying visuals, Murphy and Sterling have curated an entire theatre for the senses. It’s interesting to consider a work created about the commute of travel in relation to the stationary body at a time when travelling has become less frequent or necessary for us. Sitting still in your home, listening to Murphy’s siren songs as visuals of moving landscapes slip by, you’re taken on a complete journey without ever actually going anywhere. And with our homes having become more isolated than ever, it’s a beguiling escapism that speaks to the present moment. Experience the EP and its visuals here.
Listen to 86km from Distance On Ground below.
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