Róisín Murphy - Take Her Up to Monto, review: ‘a strange-tasting sweetie’

From her beginnings with distended dance act Moloko to her 2015 Mercury-nominated solo album Hairless Toys, Róisín Murphy has established herself as one of pop’s premiere eccentrics.

With Take Her Up to Monto the Irish singer settles into the unsettling like a familiar sweater. (The title comes from an Irish folk song, but we are far away from earthly bounds).

Opener Mastermind is a macabre melodrama with shades of David Bowie’s Blackstar in its obtuse narrative and a sparkly propulsion in its phased beats. Thoughts Wasted is a moody anthem, halfway between Detroit house and Twin Peaks, Lip Service has a sinuous tropicália, while Nervous Sleep is a crepuscular epic.