Songs: Without Music

The first volume of Irish folk-punk singer/songwriter Paul Murphy's lyric anthologies. This superb collection is mainly drawn from the period 1982 to 1997, with a few bookend pieces from either side of those years for context.

Much of the work herein covers the artists' performing years, and places an equal emphasis on his social commentary material, life reflections, and his love songs and ballads.

Many of these songs have found fresh audiences through his Internet performances, showing the uniqueness of his prose and alliteration have yet to be eclipsed in certain arenas: 'Bitter Realities', 'Urban Paranoia', 'Candle', 'So Many Times Before', and especially 'She Cried A Million Tears', remain at the pinnacle of their respective subject matters. Is there a better document of unrequited love than 'Maybe Tomorrow... Maybe Next Year', or a more harrowing dark-night of the soul prose than 'Sadness'?

On the more tender side, the epic ballads, 'The Fair Angel Of Sherborne' and 'Lady Helen' - each running over 20 minutes on album - stay high-watermarks of the genre.

Emotive, empowering, though-provoking, heartwarming and heart-rending, and occasionally, unsettling, this anthology showcases a master of the songwriting and prose-poem mediums at his peak.

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I read evil in the mind of the man you once saved
I could live with it if he loved you, but he treats you like a slave
There's a bad deal on here, that no-one can win
If I can't meet the odds, don't let the wheel spin
I don't know what you are to him, but you're more than that to me
You'll always be much more than that to me....
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