Before I begin, a disclaimer is probably in order.
I’ve known Lauren Murphy for a dozen or so years, and I’ve adored her for exactly that long. She’s family to me; I call her my sister from another mister. We have shared a lot together, from the days when she was recently widowed, and she and her daughter Lyba made the decision to leave Northern California and move back to the south, where Lauren was born raised and sang her first songs.
We’ve also worked together, many times. A song from my own band’s first record was written about that decision to move. She’s sung backup on two of our records; we’ve interviewed together and played live together. Any day I get to hear new music from Lauren is a good day.
I’ve also got a personal vibe for this song, because I’ve been to the Murphy house in Madisonville, Louisiana, where Lauren and Lyba finally found what they were looking for. That’s the basis of “Ol’ Coquille”: her love of the land where she was raised, the movement of the bayous which flood and ebb and carry all the area’s history, eddying their way back through time and culture and stories. I’ve fallen asleep to the frogs and the crickets out in the marshlands behind her house, measured up how high the house had been lifted above flood stage, heard the caterwauling of the strays. The area, legendary in the American landscape, is a breathing thing in her love song to her home, and the sense of peace she found.
For her first new recording since 2021’s EP Psychedelics, Lauren has assembled a cadre of NOLA area musicians with some scary credentials. Multi-instrumentalist and renowned Bayou folklorist Louis Michot, known for heading up the Grammy-winning Lost Bayou Ramblers, handles an impressive array of instruments on “Ol’ Coquille”: violin, accordion, bass, triangle. He’s also providing some of the backing vocals, with daughter (and cover artist) Lyba Leona adding the sweet high overtones. Ramblers guitarist Jonny Campos adds percussion, and a pedal steel that manages to bring the ghosts of that end of Lake Pontchartrain delicately into the recording. The town of Madisonville itself provides some of the soundtrack: rain, the local birdsong, traffic on the bridge, church bells. Lauren’s vocals are as deep and smoky as they’ve ever been; time and the exigencies of life these past years have brought layers and undertones to an already astonishing set of pipes. The song’s feeling of family, of finally being where she belongs, is rounded out by the cover art. As with the cover of Psychedelics, the art for “Ol’ Coquille” was done by Lyba Leona. Keep an eye open for when her pieces go up for sale, because she’s a rising star, sharing her mama’s ability to tap into deeper spaces.
“Ol’ Coquille,” with its bayou-rooted storytelling, layered production and fabulous musicality, is Lauren Murphy’s exquisite, and triumphant, return to her roots.
(self-released, 2025)
