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In a top hat, framed in black and white, Róisín Murphy stares down the lens. Facing away from the audience, she peers into a camera on a mount; the resulting image is beamed via an imposing screen at the back of the stage. With the 10,000-strong Alexandra Palace crowd behind her, she scarcely blinks as an insistent house beat burbles away.
She slips off her jacket, runs both hands down her neck, her five-piece band churning confidently through the lithe funk of ‘Can’t Replicate’. When the beat quickens, she flexes her muscles and poses like a prize fighter with arms aloft. “I need you,” the 50-year-old croons steadily, shadowboxing on the spot, never breaking eye contact, “so you don’t you keep it… I love you.”
It’s a message, perhaps, for the fans who’ve stayed with her on the rocky road to this undeniably impressive show, her biggest yet and a milestone in any artist’s career. Murphy takes a few songs to warm up, but when she does, the rewards are bountiful, as she complements her experimental dance-pop with an array of outlandish costume changes. Once she’s paired the knockabout ‘Ramalama (Bang Bang)’ with an oversized feathered headdress and the stoic ‘Something More’ with a funereal black veil, you’re well-reminded she’s been donning daft gear since Harry Styles was in his school uniform.
Six months have passed since the release of the former Moloko singer’s thrillingly weird, Balearic-flavoured sixth solo album ‘Hit Parade’. Murphy had long been a critical darling, but this record, which ebbs with a potent, insular magic, appeared destined to bring her to a whole new stratosphere of acclaim. Just over a week before it came out, though, she went viral for all the wrong reasons.
It emerged that, on her private Facebook page, the queer icon had described the use of puberty blockers in young trans people as “fucked, absolutely desolate, big pharma laughing all the way to the bank”. The screengrabbed comments duly blew up on Twitter, appalling vast swathes of her audience. Her label, Ninja Tune, reportedly ceased to market the album, an apology was issued, gigs were pulled and Róisín Murphy was quite literally cancelled.
The furore marked one of the stranger and more unexpected chapters in the culture wars. In fact, it seemed the only thing anyone could agree on was that ‘Hit Parade’ is an extraordinary album – one that became her biggest commercial success so far, reaching Number Five in the UK. And then this enormous show sold out back in December.
If the ensuing crowd is best described as “40-something and intense-looking” (there must be at least 5,000 pairs of thick-rimmed spectacles on display here), the music itself is, for the most part, transcendently light-hearted. Murphy dances cartoonishly to the crunching disco of ‘Incapable’, stopping just short of jazz hands, and grips the mic stand when she head-bangs to her ‘00s anthem ‘Overpowered’.
She says little, beyond repeated expressions of gratitude to the audience, but spends the encore doing press-ups in a floor-length sequinned gown; an image that seems to speak volumes about her determination to keep this show on the road. On tonight’s evidence, you wouldn’t bet against her.
Róisín Murphy played:
‘Pure Pleasure Seeker’
‘Dear Miami’
‘Simulation’
‘Overpowered’
‘CooCool’
‘The Universe’
‘You Knew’
‘The Time is Now’
‘Incapable’
‘Something More / Let Me Know’
‘Sing It Back / Murphy’s Law’
‘Can’t Replicate’
‘Ramalama (Bang Bang)’
‘Forever More’
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“I received plenty of comments saying it was far too soon to ‘go solo’,” Geese frontman Cameron Winter told NME last year while reflecting on how people initially reacted to his decision to branch out on his own. “Most likely because a lot of folks assume that ‘solo albums’ only happen once a band has passed its peak and that they usually feel like uninspired cash grabs.”
Honestly, everyone is trying to earn a living however they can these days, yet no one expected a Geese side project to generate any real financial payoff in 2024. “Just so you know,” he went on, “my solo album is different: because barely anyone knows my band, I am young and comfortable living with my parents and I have the freedom to follow any ideas that interest me.”
Brooklyn indie followers and former NME cover stars Geese were gaining real momentum when their second album ‘3D Country’ mixed cowboy psychedelia with a jazzy, art-punk energy that had already captured the attention of many UK 6 Music dads back in 2023, but who could have predicted what came next? Geese have become one of the most talked-about bands of 2025 and are expected to dominate multiple end-of-year lists with the ambitious and full-range rock of ‘Getting Killed’. Yet the moment that set the stage for this rise was Winter’s Lou Reed-inspired debut solo record ‘Heavy Metal’.
A handful of late-night US television appearances and a spot on Jools Holland acted as a welcoming doorway for the world to see what this 23-year-old can do far beyond what many twice or three times his age are capable of. Now the sold-out Roundhouse audience made up of indie teens, art school regulars, fans who traveled across Europe and seasoned listeners reacts with a collective breath as a slight opening in the stage curtain reveals the silhouette of Winter seated at a piano. First comes a spark of excitement, then a sudden hush.
There is no flashy social media moment, no chatter overriding the music and almost no sea of raised phones. There is a sincerity to how the night unfolds. The Geese singer barely turns toward the audience. “Turn around!” someone calls out from the balcony at one stage. “Is this not enough for you all?” Winter teases back. For some, maybe it was more than enough. At least four people appear to faint around the warm and crowded Roundhouse while the room stands in absolute focus as Winter moves through the dreamlike storytelling of ‘Try As I May’, the emotional swirl of ‘The Rolling Stones’, the bright lift of ‘Love Takes Miles’ and the sermon-like stomp of ‘Nausicaä (Love Will Be Revealed)’. When he reaches the intense and spiritually charged ‘$0’, even the most skeptical hipster might be convinced that “I’m not kidding, God is actually real”. In that moment, it feels as though we all understand.
The entire performance can be summed up in how ‘Drinking Age’ unfolds. It starts softly with a gentle touch on the keys before erupting into a thunderous attack on the Steinway that could echo into next year, followed by a long, open cry aimed toward the sky. Winter somehow manages to blend something minimal with something enormous, something grounded with something cosmic, a delicate approach that hits with staggering force as he reaches toward ideas of existence, heaven, hell and everything surrounding them.
Winter could recite the phone book and still leave a crowd stunned. He carries the spirit of a post-punk Rufus Wainwright you can play alongside The Strokes and Arctic Monkeys, a Gen Z Tom Waits for listeners exhausted by TikTok overload, a new Nick Cave who arrives at exactly the moment he is needed. His voice feels older than his years yet perfectly suited to express the concerns and emotions of his own generation.
We will continue praising Geese endlessly because they deserve it. They are an extraordinary burst of musical creativity that goes far beyond what their lineup would ever imply, and along with Fontaines D.C., they are poised to become one of the decade’s essential bands. Still, tonight offers something quieter and more intimate. Cameron Winter stands completely on his own power, talent and magnetism, proving himself a rising force who can hold an entire room with only his voice, a piano and an entire future waiting for him.
‘Try as I May’
‘Emperor XIII in Shades’
‘The Rolling Stones’
‘Love Takes Miles’
‘Drinking Age’
‘Serious World’
‘Nausicaä (Love Will Be Revealed)’
‘If You Turn Back Now’
‘Vines’
‘Nina + Field of Cops’
‘$0’
‘Take It With You’
‘Cancer of the Skull’
