Murder By Death’s eighth full-length album The Other Shore is a space-western about a ravaged Earth, its fleeing populace, and a relationship in jeopardy. It’s an epic journey rocketing toward the unknown—in the universe, within the characters represented through 11 songs, and through the band’s evolving sound. But basically, the quest poses the ultimatum: Stick with what you have, or risk it all to find something new.
Recorded at La La Land in Louisville by Kevin Ratterman (My Morning Jacket, White Reaper, Ray LaMontagne, Basia Bulat) and Anne Gauthier, The Other Shore sonically captures the mood of two lovers choosing separate paths, one who stays on Earth and one who leaves it.
As trailblazers of the early 2000s indie-Americana style, the Louisville, KY-based quintet finds a way of taking tried & true rock-and-roll and knocking it slightly off axis, into tottering revolutions of something eerie, emotional, immediate, lush, and uniquely theirs. As the album and voyage progress, the atmosphere transitions from earthy to cosmic, sober to festive—from folksy Midwestern indie rock (“Stone”) and piano-laden devil-on-one-shoulder/angel-on-the-other Leonard Cohen-style balladry (“Only Time”), to buoyant new wave recalling The Cure (“Bloom”) and celebratory jangly singalongs (“I Have Arrived”).
In between departure and arrival, there is a brooding, swirling complexity. In some moments, The Other Shore is loaded with intimate and visceral detail, like reading a manic stranger’s daily journal; and in others it’s more cinematic and visual, as if one were listening to a movie. “Alas” uncovers the pastoral air and morose gloom of a decaying land, captured by multi-instrumentalist David Fountain’s droning accordion, swelling classical cello lines from Sarah Balliet, and the echoey acoustic guitar strums and the baritone call of guitarist/singer Adam Turla. The complicated tension between diverging lovers is wretched forth as Turla resigns, “I need to stay/ But alas I must go.” Later in “True Dark,” you can hear a rattling craft soar through the cosmos, as a bounding triplet rhythm on drums and electric bass accelerate through spooky black holes, bright star twinkles, and meteoric dust.
As fear and doubt loom, hope of escape and potential flicker on the horizon. “Stone” is classic MBD built around the group’s signature gothic punk spirit and redemptive, dark horse attitude; Dagan Thogerson’s driving rhythmic pulse; a Morricone-meets-Calexico trumpet-cello duet; and Turla‘s Everyman aphorism, “Ain’t ya s’posed to bend/ ain’t ya s’posed to flex like a willow in the wind/ ain’t it easier to bend.” Eventually “Bloom,” “I Have Arrived,” and “New Old City” signal the rebirth into something new and foreign, an embryonic marriage of ‘90s indie-punk structure, the way-outedness of Ziggy Stardust, the grandeur of synth pop, and hints of dusty roots shuffle.
The Other Shore pits quantifiable reality against incalculable newness. The duality of big and broad vs. microscopic and narrow is ever-present, especially as the group explores untapped genres, dynamic and emotional touches, intersecting and introspective storylines, and remote edges of the galaxy. Welcome: After nearly 20 years, thousands of performances around the world, and eight albums—you’ve landed on your new Murder By Death.
The band has also taken their evocative sound to other evocative spaces, being the first group in recent history to play shows at the Historic Stanley Hotel in Estes Park, CO (the inspiration for Stephen King’s The Shining), which has culminated into an annual residency of sold-out performances after five years. While that event takes fans to over 7500 feet above sea level, a new experience planned for summer of 2018 will take fans 333 feet below the surface of Earth, in the middle-of-nowhere Tennessee, where MBD will play two shows in a cave in the Cumberland Caverns.
Full Bio
On the surface, Murder By Death is a Louisville, KY/Bloomington, IN quintet with a wry, ominous name. But behind the geography and moniker is a band of meticulous and literary songwriters matched by a specific brand of brooding, anthem-riding balladry and orchestral indie rock.
Murder By Death's path began in the early 2000s as most Midwestern college-town groups do, by playing to small crowds at ratty venues and frenzied house parties. While many of their formative-year scene-mates failed to make it much further than campustown's borders, Murder By Death translated their anonymous beginnings into a 10+ year career founded on a bedrock of five full-length albums, tireless D.I.Y. touring and performing ethics, and, most importantly, a dedicated, cult-like fanbase.
Since the band began in 2001, their audience has blossomed due in part to extended tours alongside similarly hardworking musical kin such as Against Me!, The Gaslight Anthem, Lucero, The Devil Makes Three, William Elliott Whitmore, Ha Ha Tonka, and others. Throughout relentless touring across the United States, Canada and Europe, Murder By Death has gained word-of-mouth devotees and support from the likes of media outlets like SPIN Magazine, who said of the band:
'They brawl like Johnny Cash's cellmates or dreamily swoon like Nick [Cave], stomping saloon floorboards in 4/4 time as grand strings fade into high noon.'
What resonates most with supporters is the band's energetic, unique, and altogether consistent sound and conceptualized vision. The personnel and ingredients of the group consist of Sarah Balliet's throaty cello melodies, singer/guitarist Adam Turla's booming baritone vocals and brawny guitar strumming, drummer Dagan Thogerson and bassist Tyler Morse's locked-down, post-punk rhythm section interplay, and David Fountain's multi-instrumentalist bag of tricks (including piano, trumpet, accordion, mandolin, vocals, percussion). The overriding sound is an amalgamation of textures ranging from dark and desolate to upbeat and brightly melodic, all of it landing somewhere under the orchestrated indie rock umbrella.
The other mainstay signature element of Murder By Death's identity has been built by the overriding concepts behind each individual album. Every successive effort conjures up fresh imaginative and tactile worlds - whether it's the battle between the Devil and a small Western town (Who Will Survive and What Will Be Left of Them?, 2003), an arid land of death and redemption (In Bocca al Lupo, 2006), or just songs inspired by a retreat into the Tennessee mountains (Good Morning, Magpie, 2010).
The band has also taken their evocative sound to other evocative spaces, being the first group in recent history to play shows at the Historic Stanley Hotel in Estes Park, CO (the inspiration for Stephen King’s The Shining), which has culminated into an annual residency of sold-out performances after five years. While that event takes fans to over 7500 feet above sea level, a new experience planned for summer of 2018 will take fans 333 feet below the surface of Earth, in the middle-of-nowhere Tennessee, where MBD will play two shows in a cave in the Cumberland Caverns.
