From The Velvets to Irving Berlin, a panoply of inspirations.
Artist Biography
An intrepid explorer of the human heart, Stephin Merritt has continually strived to capture the subject of love in all its beauty, cruelty, misery and transcendent power. The fact that Merritt is also such a witty songwriter has only intensified fans’ devotion to The Magnetic Fields, the band he’s led through many incarnations since forming in his Boston hometown in 1989. Early releases like 1994’s The Charm Of The Highway Strip were largely solo affairs, with Merritt delivering his laconic tales of love and desire in a distinctive baritone over a bed of brightly melodic synth-pop. With a larger version of the the band that included members such as his longtime foil and pianist Claudia Gonson, Merritt introduced a more elaborate sensibility on 1999’s 69 Love Songs, an ambitious triple album that expanded his stylistic repertoire to include country, jazz and Stephen Sondheim-worthy Broadway balladry. After experimenting with noise rock on 2008’s Distortion and returning to synth-pop on 2012’s Love at the Bottom of the Sea, Merritt and the Magnetic Fields tackled a new challenge with 2017’s 50 Song Memoir, a diverse and delightful musical chronicle of the first 50 years of Merritt’s life that contained enough fresh ideas to serve him for another 50.