PJ Harvey: A Dog Called Money is a uniquely intimate journey through the inspiration, writing, and recording of a PJ Harvey record.

Writer and musician Harvey and award-winning photographer Seamus Murphy decided to collaborate on this mutual adventure, and as Harvey was seeking first-hand experience of the countries she wanted to write about, she accompanied Murphy on some of his worldwide reporting trips, joining him in Afghanistan, Kosovo, and Washington DC. Harvey collected words, Murphy collected images and then upon returning home, her words become poems, songs, then an album, The Hope Six Demolition Project, which was recorded in an unprecedented art experiment in Somerset House, London. In a specially constructed room behind one-way glass, the public—all cameras surrendered—are invited to watch the 5 week process as a live sound-sculpture.

By capturing the immediacy of their encounters with the people and places they visited, Murphy traces the sources of the songs and their special metamorphosis into recorded music. The songs that we see written, composed and recorded in PJ Harvey: A Dog Called Money reveal an often intimate creative process, illustrating how Harvey’s engagement with the world—in all its richness and diversity—is given voice through her music.

Seamus Murphy  |  Ireland/UK  |  2019  |  90 mins.