Best Live Band : 2007

• 3rd May 2007

“We’ll be lucky if anyone is here!” :

As Murder By Death settle on their UK tour with their new drummer Dagan, we sit down for a chat about things past, present and current. The third date on the debut full UK tour brings them to Liverpool for the first time and we talk about how they will be received. Adam reveals they are more than worried about the turn out for tonight’s gig, “we’ll be lucky if anyone is here, we expect it to be quiet, very quiet!” I explain that many a great band has slipped through the grasp of this music loving city as the saturated scene has people’s attention pulled everywhere, with so many shows on each night of the week it is hard to keep up. (Drummer) Dagan tells me it is the same in his town of Bloomingdale Indiana. I find it hard to imagine how it is the same, given there will be three different gigs on this street alone not including the different one entirely in the same building, but I do not argue with the man. He is after all in Murder By Death one of our favourite bands of this year and I am in the presence of idols.

I grow immediately fond of Sarah, petite, blonde and welcoming, we make friends and I sense there is no huge ego or tiredness in place. This is new experience for Murder By Death and they are happy to meet people and answer questions.
This is only the second time I have been able to meet my idols and my nerves had diminished none since the disastrous time I met Jason Reese from …And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead.
I was determined this time would not be such an ordeal. I am grateful for the female influence in the room and sense that Sarah keeps the band in check and is mature enough to sensibly handle these situations. I also sense that Sarah is not averse to doing most of the leg work for the band, such as handling the merchandise counters herself, the band travelling with such a light tour party of just five people – the band and tour manager Will.

“Every book he has written is a classic.”

Singer Adam Turla is a sick man. You wouldn’t think it to hear him sing but he is sick as a dog when the band arrive in Liverpool. You may consider anyone with fascinations with death, murder and execution to be sick but he can barely talk without exploding into a coughing fit. Throughout this interview he points and reads and sips his drink. supping on a pint of hot tea and thumbing through a copy of ‘East is Eden’ by John Steinbeck. He cites Steinbeck as the greatest. Every title he has written is a classic according to Adam and he is keen to list them all. Could this novel be the inspiration for the new album? With plans to record in September and studio time already in place Murder By Death rarely write on tour yet are not short of material or inspiration and are equally keen to get Dagan on a record, “as soon as possible.” Playing on a record kind of cements your history in the band depsite the years of endless toil of touring you may go through.

On stage, as Adam rips into ‘Sometimes The Line Walks You’, I could be forgiven for thinking the singer is overprotective of his voice, dramatic but there are signs through the smiles and the good times that there is real pain there. You’d have to be looking for it and I was. I was worried.

Turla is a storyteller at heart. And it carries through in the lyrics like an unfolding melancholy epic, like a 13-verse Bob Dylan song Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts. Despite this, the instrumental track I am unable to put a name to contains as much of a story as the verses and choruses of the others. Epic and operatic in its structure, the subtlest of dynamics are played out.

Genre: American

Despite the Italian album title and the Irish folk vibe, there is only one simple way to, if you must, pigeonhole Murder By Death. It may seems strange that this collection of songs be labelled ‘American’, but this range of themes covering death, capital punishment, murder, imprisonment and the family, there could be nothing more poignant or American.
Murder By Death are a band that represents the rotten core of the evil empire without forcing political scripture down our throats; barely even touching on the politics. The stories are deeper connected. As Adam puts it these are “cowboy songs about whiskey and fighting”. Applying them to modern day themes is easier than envisioning a band playing novelty wild western songs about times gone by.

“We love to play and we love to travel.”

“The aim is to reach the farthest reaches of the Earth. The four corners of the globe.” It’s easy to mistake Murder By Death as old hands on the tour circuit. Travelling the US constantly and releasing three albums in the gaps, they are still young and fresh and maybe this translates into the music they are currently producing.

The visual backdrop which seemed so vital to the live show but is too much to transport on the budget tour is not missed. Without experiencing it first hand one can say any visual aid would only serve to distract away from the striking personalities on the stage: Sarah in her elegant yet forceful altogether graceful posture. Dagan is ever-smiling through cheeky dimples. Bassist Matt chain smokes hands free mulling over his distortion peddles as he arpeggios and tempts the devil from the chest. Adam is pained, inspired and focused. At peace with the crowd the struggle lies within. The image is harmony and discord.

There is no fear of another 21 hour round trip to retrieve lost luggage while in the UK. Sarah recounts the biggest tour disaster she and Murder By Death have faced on their travels, after leaving her cello in Buffalo, then driving to Ohio before realizing. The UK is not so perilously vast and this band of gypsy travellers bearing sweet musical gifts are welcome strangers to these parts. When they return they may not be so unfamiliar. The crowd tonight worshipped the songs and treasured the new album In Bocca Al Lupo and we hope the band were surprised by how many people had come out to see it, the first time Murder By Death came to Liverpool.