Take Her Up to Monto | ||||
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Studio album by Róisín Murphy | ||||
Released | 8 July 2016 | |||
Recorded | 2014–16 | |||
Studio | RMS Studios, Fish Factory Studio (London) | |||
Genre | avant-garde pop | |||
Length | 46:58 | |||
Label | Play It Again Sam | |||
Producer | Eddie Stevens | |||
Róisín Murphy chronology | ||||
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Singles from Take Her Up to Monto | ||||
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Professional ratings | |
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Aggregate scores | |
Source | Rating |
Metacritic | 77/100 |
Review scores | |
Source | Rating |
AllMusic | |
Clash | 9/10 |
Drowned in Sound | 8/10 |
The Guardian | |
Mixmag | 8/10 |
Mojo | |
NOW | |
Pitchfork | 7.8/10 |
The Quietus | Very positive |
Uncut |
Take Her Up to Monto is the fourth studio album by Irish singer Róisín Murphy, released on 8 July 2016 by Play It Again Sam. It was co-produced with longtime collaborator Eddie Stevens during the same five-week session period that resulted in Murphy's previous album, Hairless Toys (2015).
Take Her Up to Monto was recorded during the same sessions as Murphy's 2015 album Hairless Toys, and included producer and longtime collaborator Eddie Stevens. The title is derived from an Irish folk song of the same name, popularised by The Dubliners in the 1960s, which Murphy's father sang to her as a child.Monto is the nickname of Dublin's old red-light district.
The album's release was preceded by two tracks, "Mastermind" and "Ten Miles High", as well as Murphy's self-directed video for the latter, which was filmed in London. Comparing the album with its predecessor, Murphy stated that "the visual language has changed. Less reference, a more aggressively modern aesthetic. It's about the London that I live in, it's a lot about architecture, it's about building and the future coming, its about here! It's a bit fizzier and more present tense, irreverent, with guerilla filming, montage and crazy shit. I hope it's a that makes you feel good about being alive."
Take Her Up to Monto received generally positive reviews from critics.Mixmag described the album as "another reminder of why [Murphy] has more charm, chutzpah and ideas than most of her peers put together," calling it "a complex and endlessly enjoyable record."NOW described it as "an album of extremes, following its own wandering logic," suggesting "it feels as though she wants to see how much she can reduce her theatrical pop image into something small and seemingly impermanent." In Exclaim!, Anna Alger wrote "Her songs on this record often feel like symphonies, with multiple movements evolving throughout a five-to-seven-minute period."