Cafe Heartbeat Concert On A USB Stick: Radio T in Chemitz, Germany recently recorded an Elliott Murphy And The Normandy All Stars Featuring Olivier Durand show at the great Cafe Heartbeat in Zwonitz and to satisfy the fans who wanted to take that great night home with them Radio T immediately burned engraved USB sticks to purchase after the show. The set list is:
1. The Valley Below
2. O Wyoming
3. A Touch of Mercy
4. Green River
5. Sonny
6. Pneumonia Alley
7. The Day after Valentine's Day
8. Razzmatazz
9. Canaries In The Mind
10. You Never Know What You're In For
11. The Last of the Rock Stars
12. On Elvis Presley's Birthday
Here's the link to purchase the USB. They still have a limited supply left so act fast.
We're so East Coast! Elliott Murphy will be returning to the East Coast of the U.S.A. for five shows in mid April 2009 on his Memory and Desire tour. Elliott will be performing with his incredible French backing band The Normandy All Stars featuring his amazing guitarist Olivier Durand. Once again, opening the show will be singer-songwriter Jann Klose and expect some surprises during Elliott's encores. Dates are confirmed in Fairfield CT, Fall River MA, Asbury Park NJ, Hoboken NY and Amagansett NY - check Tour section for details. These will be Elliott's first USA shows with a band in over a decade. For booking/gig information Anne Leighton and stay tuned for more information. "We're so East Coast - So here's a toast - Here's to everything that I wanted the most." ("Change Will Come")
Crawdaddy! Feature Article: One of the true original and long standing American rock 'n roll mags, Crawdaddy!, has posted a long interview and feature article on Elliott on their site written by legendary rock writer and long time Murphy admirer Mick Skidmore. Check it out.
I wish they all could be California Girls! Elliott Murphy will be playing his first West Coast shows in the U.S.A. in twelve years in January 2009 on his Hollywood Tour! Opening the show will be up and coming singer songwriter Jann Klose and Elliott will be appearing as a duo with his amazing guitarist Olivier Durand. Dates are confirmed in San Francisco, Santa Cruz, Tehachapi, San Diego, Long Beach and at the NAMM show in Anaheim - check Tour section for details. Plans for an April 2009 Mid West tour with band are in the works. For booking/gig information Anne Leighton and stay tuned for more information. Hollywood - you shaped my life with a technicolor carving knife ...
Hometown boy makes good! The Marie of the 6th Arrondisement in Paris, along with the University Paris Diderot, will host a two week long exposition honoring the 35 year career in music and literature of Elliott Murphy from September 10 - 26, 2008 entitled Elliott Murphy - Last of the Rock Stars - Retrospective that will culminate with a live concert on 26 September. It will be located in the beautiful Mairie (town hall) of the 6th Arrondisement in Paris right near the famous cafés of St. Germain. If you're planning a trip to Paris and you're an Elliott Murphy fan it's a great time to visit the city of light which Elliott has called home for the past 18 years. Right click on the image to download a full size, press quality PDF poster. (It's a big file.)
Elliott, Gaspard and Bruce: On June 27, 2008 Elliott Murphy and his talented guitarist son Gaspard Murphy joined Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band for "Born To Run" in front of 50,000 ecstatic fans at Parc de Princes in Paris, France. When Bruce invited Elliott to join him on stage shortly before the show and suggested "Born to Run" Elliott thought he might be unsure of the chords but Gaspard piped in that he could teach Dad as he knew the song by heart. And Bruce, in an incredible gesture of generosity, said "Well, if you know the song Gaspard then you can come up and play it too!" An unforgettable night for a father and son reunion and a memory that will last forever. See a larger version of the photo.
US radio airplay! "What's That" - an exciting up-tempo track from Elliott's recent release Notes From The Underground in which he sings his way through the entire alphabet ("A is for amazed when you walk out of the show - B is for bedazzled its the witching hour") is receiving airplay on NEXT: A New Music Show on radio station The Peak 107.1 from White Plains, New York. If you listen to The Peak and would like to hear more Elliott Murphy music on that great rock station send them an email at studio@1071thepeak.com and let them know.
New album now available! Elliott Murphy's new album Notes From The Underground is now available in the store here at elliottmurphy.com. It's also available at iTunes:
New online store! We've launched a new store here at elliottmurphy.com. Most of the items are available at our special "nice" price. We'll be adding more items soon. Visit the new store HERE.
Remember though, this is just a small portion of the Elliott Murphy CDs and LPs available. You can find a much larger collection at the "Official" Elliott Murphy store located HERE. You'll also find T-Shirts and books there.
New MP3 of "Canaries In The Mind." A solo acoustic version of the song from Coming Home Again. LISTEN NOW
Elliott Murphy and Red Lounge Records announce the release of The Murphys - The 1973 Aquashow Demos - on a limited Vinyl edition:
The album features a stunning photo from the original Aquashow sessions taken at the Plaza Hotel in New York City and consists of the very high quality demos that Elliott Murphy, Matthew Murphy and friend George Gates recorded before the final Aquashow sessions. Click here for more information and to order.
Purchase Downloads
You can now purchase selected song downloads directly from this site. Currently you can purchase individual songs from Coming Home Again for $0.99 each. More songs will be added in the future.
New CD! Coming Home Again
From the opening drum fill of "Pneumonia Alley" it's clear that Elliott Murphy's 29th album Coming Home Again is something very special in the career of this legendary singer-songwriter. Coming Home Again is already being talked about as a return to the classic Murphy songwriting style that marked his early albums Aquashow and Just A Story From America. Recorded in Le Havre, France with a talented crew of musicians from Europe and America including virtuoso French guitarist Olivier Durand and New York keyboardist Kenny Margolis. In this impressive collection of 13 new songs Murphy tips his hat to cultural icons as diverse as Hemingway and Paris Hilton and exotic locales from India to Veracruz although the music and words belongs to that mythical place his fans now call Murphyland. They will even give you a passport if you ask!*
Coming Home Again features moving anthems ("Pneumonia Alley") and righteous rockers ("Marianne's Garage Sale") and of course the tender ballads Murphy is famous for "(Making Friends With The Dead" & "Home Again") as well as a eulogy to a fallen musical comrade ("Jesse"). The album includes a track so radio-friendly ("A Touch of Kindness") that perhaps we'll be hearing Elliott Murphy back on the radio all over the world once again as with his FM hits of the past "Drive All Night" and "Anastasia."
Murphy (who with guitarist Olivier Durand plays over 100 shows a year all over Europe) says that most of the songs were recently written on the road: "After my blues album Murphy Gets Muddy I wanted to get back to a rich and diverse sound and I was confident that my current band (drummer Alan Fatras [ex-Moon Martin] and bassist Laurent Pardo [ex-Kid Pharoen] and of course guitarist Olivier Durand could give me what I wanted to hear when we went into the studio. In fact, I could hear the finished songs in my head even before we began recording and all the musicians seemed to read my mind. We recorded in-between tours at Florent Barbier's [ex-Roadrunners] brand new studio in Le Havre. For many years now I've been an expatriate American musician living in Paris and on the road and to tell the truth I don't know where home is anymore. But I know that Coming Home Again is where I want to be."
Come home to the legendary sound of singer-songwriter Elliott Murphy with Coming Home Again and you'll never want to leave!
iTunes! Almost all of Elliott's albums are now available for purchase at iTunes, both in Europe and the US. 24 albums are currently available, including the "Vintage Series" releases (which are available at a special low price). You can purchase entire albums or individual songs. And the best part is all the proceeds go to Elliott, not some record label somewhere. Click this button to view Elliott's albums at iTunes.
New MP3 of "Open City." A radio performance of "Open City" By Elliott and Olivier Durand at Radio Paradiso on Suisse Radio recorded February 24, 2006. LISTEN NOW
Read Elliott's thoughts about Paul Nelson who died recently. Paul was important to Elliott in the early days of his career and without Paul's help Elliott would probably never have been noticed by the rock critics who were so influential at the time. Read Elliott's essay HERE.
Download Elliott's original handwritten lyrics for "Winners, Losers, Beggars, Choosers."
Franck Dumaine was kind enough to send us the original handwritten lyrics for this classic song. We've reproduced them as a PDF file which you can download HERE.
Aquashow featured in Uncut magazine. The April 2006 edition of the UK's Uncut magazine features a full page article on Aquashow under the heading "All-Time Classics." We've reproduced it as a PDF file which you can download HERE.
Join the new Elliott Murphy Mailing List. We'll keep you updated with news and information about Elliott, tour dates, CD releases and more. JOIN NOW
Download Elliott's original liner notes for the Velvet Underground's 1969 Live
Elliott recently came across his original liner notes for the Velvet Underground's 1969 Live album. We've reproduced them as a PDF file which you can download HERE.
It Was Twenty Years Ago Today Sergeant Murphy Taught The French To Play ... Part One
My Many Hometowns...
I moved to Paris 20 years ago next month. Can't believe it myself. I've lived here longer than anyplace else in my life, a third of my life and longer then New York City or Long Island. And I've received more mail addressed to me at rue Beauregard then at any other mailbox that has had my name affixed to it. So now I'm trying to think of all the addresses I've had in my life where I stayed longer then a month before my memory starts fading. I've already forgotten most of the shows I've played. (But luckily Oliver remembers them all!)
I guess it all started at 99 Stratford Ave., Garden City, Long Island, New York. Well, it really started at Mercy Hospital in Rockville Center, Long Island but Stratford Avenue was my home for the first eleven years of my life. Ninety-nine is a great number full of promise and adventure and the 50's were prosperous and exciting days for my family, my father's Aquashow was running six nights a week with a full house except when it rained and Duke Ellington filled the skies of Flushing Meadows with his amazing indigo harmonies. I remember sitting in those amphitheatre seats with my mother watching the fireworks. Still love fireworks and the way they send me back in time to revisit my childhood awe and wonder. My dad was a depression-era kid from Brooklyn and he made it from poverty to prosperity solely by the force of his wits. Always advised me to have a real profession – doctor or lawyer or such – but I didn't listen. I just wanted the fireworks and I guess rock ‘n roll is pretty close to that. My dad loved cars, was a great mechanic (he would take apart and rebuild my bicycles when he couldn't sleep) and loved bathing in the glory of the New York celebrity life he was living at that time.
Around the time of John F. Kennedy's inauguration we moved to a grand house on 111 10th Street, Garden City, Long Island. From 99 to 111 – wonder what that means – and my Dad opened a restaurant nearby called The Sky Club. There was a political club attached to the restaurant and Robert F. Kennedy and Nelson Rockefeller came to speak. My father was a Republican, believed in the self-made man but I never saw him look so sad as when we (like all of America) watched John F. Kennedy's funeral on black and white TV. I don't believe in conspiracy theories but it just seemed the world went crazy for a while from that terrible day onward. The country lost the Kennedy brothers and Martin Luther King and my family lost my father, my cousin and my uncle in quick succession. We hung on in the big house for a few years after my father's death and my formidable mother did a gallant job of trying to keep the restaurant afloat but it was too much for her with three teenage kids and the wolf constantly at the door. The Christmas after my father died there was no money for presents for all of us so my mom bought the family a color TV. I've been addicted to television ever since.
So then the magic numbers stopped for a while and my mother moved us into a small but nice house at 72 Bayberry Ave. in the less posh part of Garden City. My sister Michelle came home from college and became a Pam Am stewardess which would dramatically affect my own future; my brother Matthew fell in love with the girl across the street and eventually learned to play the bass; and, I just kept banging away on the guitar, forming bands with high hopes such as The Rapscallions, King James Version, Stud (yes!) and Bang Zoom which were all relegated to the dustbin of rock ‘n roll history sooner then we had imagined.
In the late 60's my own On The Road period began with a brief sojourn in St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands where I played at the same club The Mamas and Papas had been the house band a few years before. I did a year and a half at Nassau Community College to beat the draft and studied literature – mostly The Great Gatsby and had two effervescent professors who changed my life. Thought about becoming an actor and did a monologue from Albee's Zoo Story which got me the only A in the class but the guitar was my jealous mistress and I never strayed far. Finally, thanks to my sister's Pan Am connection I got a cheap flight to Europe and my life changed abruptly. Playing on the streets of Rome, passing the hat, a bit part in a Felllini film and a love for Europe that never really went away, I can say now, for here I am today.
But that all took a while. In brief: came back to the US via San Francisco, wrote more songs and played open mic nights on Fisherman's Wharf. Got sick, came back east, recovered and hooked back up with my brother Matthew on a mission to get a record contract. And we pounded the streets of Manhattan until that dream finally came true. But even a dream come true become reality and that's where the problems began for me.
Too Much Too Soon was the name of my friends The New York Dolls album who were recording at the Record Plant in New York at the same time as me. But it was my story too. My first album Aquashow came out with a very modest promotional push from the record label but the media reaction was overwhelming. And overwhelmed I was. All of a sudden I was everybody but myself. Got married, moved around a few times in Manhattan until we found a nice pre-war two bedroom, 15 floors up on East 72nd Street. The smaller bedroom was my music room and I sat at my Wurlitzer electric piano and wrote "Diamonds By The Yard" while staring at the nightlights of Manhattan. Columbia Records brought two famous London Rock critics up to interview me, thought it would add the personal touch if they visited me at home. They saw my place with Robert Altman posters on the wall and told me punks don't live like this while they devoured my booze. I threw them out. I developed bad habits that took years to admit to and conquer a day at a time. I climbed (or was pushed) up the rock ‘n roll mountain and fell (or jumped) off the other side.
Matthew and I had lived at the Drake Hotel, New York City while recording Aquashow and I stayed for 3 months at the Beverly Hills Hotel while making Lost Generation and even longer at London's posh Montcalm hotel during Just A Story From America. I still feel most at home in a room with a number on the door.
But by the end of the 70's it all came crashing down, the whole damn facade and I found myself sleeping on a cot in my mother's apartment on East 80th Street. But I still had my old Stratocaster and could still coax a few songs out of it. Looking back, it wasn't so bad – my Mom has always been my biggest fan – and I kept at my music, toured Europe time to time and got real. Then through the aid of a Southern Belle with a heart of gold I got my own place on 26 Gramercy Park South and once ran into Jody Foster in the vestibule of the building during Ronald Reagan's assassination attempt by a deranged fan of hers. I was playing weekly gigs at Tramps, a nearby Blues joint and watering hole and was marking time. The past is the only thing that lasts if you move too fast. Who said that and why didn't I listen?
Milwaukee figures in there as well and straightening out for good and another brief but magical marriage but all this moving around is making me dizzy. Suffice it to say that somewhere along the line a friend of mine asked me the hardest question in the world “What do you want to do?” and I was lucid enough to respond “Move to Paris!” and before I knew it there I was on rue de Faubourg Saint Antoine near Bastille, writing songs for 12 and thinking for the first time in my life I'm finally where I want to be. I felt like anything was possible. And it was.
I re-found Françoise, the love of my life, and we started to build a home at 26 rue Beauregard (same number as my Gramercy Park address!) on the 5th floor with no elevator 300-year-old building with a panoramic view for this American in Paris. Our son Gaspard was born a year later. From his window you can see Sacre Coeur and from my small terrace I can see the lights of the Eiffel Tower. It's not the mansion on the hill I was dreaming about while trying to get a record contract with my brother Matthew all those years ago but destiny knows best. I'm about as happy as I get here. In fact, I should be happier for a man as blessed as me and I'm working on it every day
I am now, for all intents and purposes, a Parisian. What does that mean? It means that I have the right to walk around this magnificently beautiful city – an aesthetic delight, the number one tourist destination in all the world – and I can l complain like all the other Parisians about the traffic, or the Metro strikes or the price of electricity. But I think this is some kind of superstition like if we all admitted how wonderful this city is then it would be taken away from us. And France has been very good to me. People always ask me why I left America and I have to explain that I didn't leave America, in fact I still love it and miss it everyday, but I was on a journey both personal and professional and this is where the rock ‘n roll river let me off for a while. I'm not complaining.
Elliott Murphy - June 13, 2009
This photo was taken in the Town Hall of the 6th Arrondisement on the left bank of Paris where the exposition Elliott Murphy – Last of the Rock Stars was held last September where I was welcomed in the impressive bosom of none other then Marianne, the bare-breasted symbol of the French Revolution.
Read more archived messages from Elliott.
