Singer
Jessie Murph digs into sensual delights and real-life trauma on her sophomore album, 2025's
Sex Hysteria. The record follows 2024's
That Ain't No Man That's the Devil and once again showcases
Murph's heady, Southern-fried trap-pop, a style that fuses
Lana Del Rey's reverb-laden, '60s-inspired romanticism with a Dirty South hip-hop swagger. She kicks things off with "Gucci Mane," interpolating the name-checked rapper's "Lemonade" into a candid examination of her childhood and troubled relationship with her father. It's a bold opening and one that nicely sets the tone for the messy relationships, desires, and questionable life choices she explores throughout the album. With her cherubic Alabama vocal lilt and gutsy, "IDGAF" attitude,
Murph is a master at pulling you into her sultry, half-lidded atmosphere. She underscores this vibe on the title track, singing, "I burn like peppermint, I binge like cinnamon/A spike in insulin/Acetaminophen/You wait in wet cement/I trip into your hands/A slow carcinogen." Often, she pushes the sensual envelope, as in "Touch Me Like a Gangster" a '60s girl group-sounding number with a tongue-in-cheek sadomasochistic twist where she coos, "I want that strange/What stay hidden in your brain, baby." Similarly, we get the erotic slow jam of "I Like How I Look" and the tipsy hook-up anthem "A Little Too Drunk," songs that underscore her attraction to "bad boys," even as they reinforce the notion that she's the O.G. in the situation. In stark contrast, the moody piano ballad "The Man That Came Back" has the texture of pure biography, detailing the trauma of living with an abusive, alcoholic father. Yet these grounded moments are nicely balanced with songs that soar with a top-down car-ride energy, including "Couldn't Be Worse" with its buzzy,
Prince-esque synth-guitar riff. She also gets a smiling assist from
Gucci Mane himself, singing about cars, good times, and their shared Alabama pride on "Donuts." At turns harrowing and hedonistic,
Sex Hysteria is a beguiling experience. ~ Matt Collar
.
