A Case for Shame
by Moby

Album: Innocents (2013)
Play Video

Songfacts®:

  • This track features vocals by Cold Specks, who is the pseudonym of a Canadian singer-songwriter called Al Spx. Based in London, England, Spx has a deep south sound, which she calls "doom soul."

    The song is one of two on Moby's Innocents album on which she features, with the recordings taking place in November 2012 while she toured. "He had heard about me because I'm on Mute in America and the UK," Spx told The Huffington Post. "He heard about the record ("I Predict A Graceful Expulsion") and asked if I wanted to sing. So I went and I sang."

    "It was a very free, collaborative, creative environment," Spx added. "He was really open to what I was doing and luckily he liked what I was doing and it worked really well."
  • The song's music video features Moby immersed in his pool at his Los Angeles home. Some masked individuals can be seen cavorting about (they also crop up on the Innocents album art). It was the first video that Moby both directed and shot himself. He explained its narrative as follows: "I've drowned, and I've gone to an afterlife inhabited by people who are concealing themselves because of shame. The masks are not meant to be conventionally frightening, the masks and sheets are being worn because the after-life people are hiding, because they're ashamed."
  • Innocents is Moby's 11th studio album and finds the electronic musician, who sold millions of records with his 1999 breakthrough, Play, unconcerned with record sales. He told Rolling Stone: "It's really great and emancipating to be a middle-aged guy making a record at a time when people don't buy records. About eight years ago, I had a friend who put out a book, and another friend who was directing an off-off-off-Broadway play. The book sold 20,000 copies, and that was a success. My director friend had about 800 people come see his play, and he was thrilled. And I started thinking, why, in the world of music, is success judged in hundreds of thousands and millions? I started thinking about my own records that way, and then the world reinforced that. Not selling that many records enforced a degree of purity: I'm making earnest, heartfelt music and hoping people are willing to listen to it. As opposed to in the Nineties, when a band no one cared about could sell millions of records."
  • While the album didn't appear on the pop tallies in the US or UK, it made an impression on the dance charts, peaking at #8 on UK Dance Albums and #2 on US Top Dance/Electronic Albums.
  • This was used on the TV show The Originals in the 2013 episode "Tangled Up In Blue."

Comments

Be the first to comment...

Editor's Picks

Christmas Songs

Christmas SongsFact or Fiction

Rudolf, Bob Dylan and the Singing Dogs all show up in this Fact or Fiction for seasonal favorites.

Francesca Battistelli

Francesca BattistelliSongwriter Interviews

The 2011 Artist of the Year at the Dove Awards isn't your typical gospel diva, and she thinks that's a good thing.

Janet Jackson

Janet JacksonFact or Fiction

Was Janet secretly married at 18? Did she gain 60 pounds for a movie role that went to Mariah Carey? See what you know about Ms. Jackson.

Krishna Das

Krishna DasSongwriter Interviews

The top chant artist in the Western world, Krishna Das talks about how these Hindu mantras compare to Christian worship songs.

Charlotte Caffey of The Go-Go's

Charlotte Caffey of The Go-Go'sSongwriter Interviews

Charlotte was established in the LA punk scene when a freaky girl named Belinda approached her wearing a garbage bag.

Colin Hay

Colin HaySongwriter Interviews

Established as a redoubtable singer-songwriter, the Men At Work frontman explains how religion, sobriety and Jack Nicholson play into his songwriting.