“I am ice cream > I am weed” (Paper Mag): Crystal Murray’s “Too Much To Taste” 😏

October 15 2021
Photo by Solal Cardo

19-year-old Parisian artist Crystal Murray today shares latest single “Too Much to Taste” via Because Music (SHYGIRL, Logic1000, Christine & The Queens), and announces her forthcoming second EP, Twisted Bases, due out February 2022. Listen/watch HERE.

The second single to be lifted from Twisted Bases following the unapologetic anthem “Like It Nasty”, “Too Much to Taste” continues to contort Crystal Murray’s roots in jazz and soul into new shapes, absorbing influences from her familial African-American and Spanish roots alongside the rave and experimental pop cultures of the Paris underground. Seductive and intoxicating, “Too Much to Taste” surges with an addictive rush of house-indebted beats, shimmering synths and a funk-riddled bass line that underlie Murray’s sly vocals. Just as on “Like It Nasty”, “Too Much to Taste”  embodies the mature poise that comes with being fully in touch with every part of yourself. The lush accompanying video video was shot in Paris at  La fête à Neuneu (funfair) and directed by Alma de Ricou and Manon Engel, with DOP André Chemetoff.

Raised in Paris by an African-American jazz saxophonist father and a Franca-Spanish mother who lived for music, Crystal grew up on tour listening to a rotating soundtrack of Sly & The Family Stone, Kelis, Macy Gray, John Coltrane, and more. By the age of 13, she’d gone viral as part of Gucci Gang – not the Hip Hop supergroup – a teenage fashion-influencer foursome bringing a Gen Z perspective to the Parisian fashion space. Vogue, I-D, Vice, Dazed, and more, took notice of their vision, but the foursome was quickly motivated to give back to other young women and use their influence for good. The collective started ‘Safe Place,’ an online platform that helps gives voice to people who have suffered sexual abuse and harassment, before mutually disbanding after four years together. 

Crystal’s debut 2019 single “After Ten” marked her first foray into music, followed by “Princess”, which landed on a Bella Hadid-starring Dior Beauty advertisement, flinging Crystal into the limelight as a fresh new voice. Nostalgic and playful, crossing R&B and soul, Crystal’s debut Sacha Rudy-produced 2020 EP, I WAS WRONG, was an ode to being a teenager and every changeable emotion that comes with it. Speaking on love, lust, parties, building expectations, and watching them come crashing down; Crystal’s lyricism is honest and raw, her sound energetic and soulful. Subsequent standalone singles “GGGB”, the Elheist-featuring “CREEPS” and “BOSS” arrived later that year into early 2021, followed by an explosive COLORS performance that served to bridge the divide between I Was Wrong and the sonic eclecticism of her forthcoming debut LP. 

The very antithesis of formulaic, Twisted Bases encompasses every corner of Crystal Murray’s vast creative range and bristles with a healthy aptitude for rule-breaking, veering between styles and genres not only across its entire runtime but often within the course of the same song, from low slung beats to glitched-out, pitched-shifted experimental pop to the confident, club-ready alt-R&B of “Like It Nasty” to the dazzling dance-pop of “Too Much to Taste”. Written during the summer of 2020 while in residency in Portugal and recorded in Paris, Twisted Bases channels the fury, fear and sense of insecurity felt at the onset of a new romance, the imminent upside-downing of your entire world for better or for worse. 

Selling out her first headline Paris shows, performing with Aloe Blacc on TV, reaching millions of streams on Spotify alone, and garnering praise from the likes of Paper, Office Mag, COLORS, Clash Magazine, DIY Mag, BBC6Music, BBC 1XTRA’s Jamz Supernova, BBC Radio 1’s Jack Saunders, and more, Crystal has taken her career into her own hands, emerging as a truly unique and inimitable artist to watch. 

Too Much To Taste” is out now from Crystal Murray’s Twisted Bases EP out February 2022,
buy/stream “Too Much to Taste” here.



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