By Meg Jorsh

Last updated 09:28, Saturday, 23 August 2008

SHE’S a slippery character, that Roisin Murphy. In two solo albums, the former Moloko singer has gone from indie queen of weird to electro pop sensation. Who knows what she’ll do for the next?

Two things are fairly certain. Firstly, she’ll sing. Her breathy voice is seductive and powerful, her soft Irish accent tinged with a cheeky hint of Manc.

Secondly, she’ll wear some amazing clothes. Whether you like it or not, she dresses like a 60s Bjork presenting children’s television.

In musical terms though, it’s likely to be a mixed bag. She explains: “Everything I’ve done has been an absolutely massive jump.

“When I do an album, it’s part of an ongoing story. If I’m allowed to tell it, it’ll have compound interest.”

Which leads to her current obsession. Over the last few months, Roisin has been studying economics.

“I’m fed up of hearing all this stuff on the news and not understanding,” she says. “You watch the telly and a guy’s saying ‘We can’t put interest rates down because of inflation.’ I still couldn’t tell you why.

“But the way I look at it, the market is just one way of looking at what’s going on in society.”

Before she got into economics, she was listening to philosophy lectures on her ipod. Clearly, she’s driven to learn.

“It’s fun,” she says. “When you know you’ve got something creative coming up, you want to feed stuff in that has nothing to do with writing songs.”

With her third album in its early stages, she’s still not sure what it’s going to sound like.

She says: “I’m thinking about it – we haven’t been in the studio yet. I think it’ll just be getting deeper into the lines I’ve already traced.”

For her solo debut, she created the quirky, moody Ruby Blue with producer Matthew Herbert. It came about just after she split from Moloko and former partner Mark Brydon.

“It was very important, because it was the first solo album I’d made. It was a very intimate record,” she says.

Her musical career began in 1994, when she met Mark at a party. Her opening line was “Do you like my tight sweater?”

“He said ‘That’d be good on a tune.’ So we went to his studio in the middle of the night and made a track,” she says. “We started a relationship together, and just carried on from there.”

The duo went on to record four albums as Moloko, enjoying international success with 1999 single Sing It Back. Their relationship broke down in 2001, but they were contractually obliged to carry on recording.

“It was a very protracted break-up,” she says. “I haven’t spoken to him in a while, but when I do it’s about our shared friendship.”

So, what are her aspirations as a solo artist?

She says: “You’ve fulfilled one of my aspirations by asking me that question.

“I didn’t know much about music when I started. I’ve fought my way through and I think that’s no mean feat.”

Born in Arklow, County Wicklow, she was surrounded by music as a child. At the age of 12, she moved to Manchester with her family.

“I was cheeky and very creative as a kid,” she says. “I think I was probably a bit of a scallywag.”

She picked up her fashion sense from her mother, an antique dealer. Together they would pick out 1960s fashions at car boot sales and charity shops.

These days, she’s more into travelling the world. “I like going further afield for gigs,” she says. “It’s a lot more fun for the band and me.

“We recently played in Georgia for their independence day. Little did we know what was going to happen there.”

Roisin hit the Solfest stage with a bang last night, in a summer of gigs including Poland, Belgium, Romania and Portugal.

MJorsh@cngroup.co.uk