Temples

Temples – Volcano (2017) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 15, 2023 · Comments off

With their first album, Sun Structures, Temples tapped into the essence of what makes psychedelic pop so enchanting. The swirling sonic textures filled with chiming guitars and booming basslines, the trippy arrangements and moody melodies…they combined into an aural experience on par with the best psych pop. When it came time to record their second album, Volcano, the band made some changes. This time James Bagshaw split the writing duties with the rest of the band, they moved to a bigger room in his house to record, and they added synthesizers to the array of instruments. The biggest shift isn’t anything tangible; it’s more in the tone and outlook of the record. Sun Structures had the feel of a band whose members were stuck deep in their own heads, making music that echoed the bands they loved. Volcano sounds like an album made to be played on a big stage at an outdoor festival. The sounds have been simplified, the choruses pumped up, and the vocals stripped of the reverb haze they were buried in. The arrangements are still fully colored-in, but they are sharper and less swathed in psych pop mystery. Where a track like Sun Structures’ “Shelter Song” enveloped the listener in a murky, entrancing embrace that felt personal and somewhat secret, the songs on Volcano are destined to be sung along to at top volume by strangers in a field. That’s not an intrinsically bad thing, but it does mean that listening to Volcano is a very different kind of experience. The synthesizers on the opening track, “Certainty,” see to that right away, and the coldness that they bring to the mix is in direct contrast with the expansive 12-string electric guitar sound that dominated Sun Structures. That being said, there are still many good things to be found on Volcano. The band still has a way with a hook — the synth parts on “Certainty” are liable to be an unshakeable earworm after one spin — and the songs occasionally take flight on waves of synths and guitars, especially on the back half of the record when the band gets a second wind. “Open Air” and “In My Pocket” have the uptempo strum and strut the Cure had at their stadium rock peak during the late ’80s, “Mystery of Pop” suggests what Ratatat might have sounded like if they were huge Left Banke fans, and “Roman God-like Man” has a nicely chugging rhythm that bursts into some sweet harmony guitar leads. These tracks don’t sound much like Sun Structures either, but thanks to the injection of energy and drive, they turn out better than some of the leaden tracks that weigh down the album’s first half. It makes for a disjointed record that’s definitely not Sun Structures II, but something transitional instead. Fans of the first album may be disappointed by the changes, especially since the band takes most of the psych out of its pop. Those who stick around will find that Volcano is a pretty good modern pop record. ~ Tim Sendra

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Temples – Sun Structures (2014) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 15, 2023 · Comments off

We wanted to create something special. A record which could be listened to in one go, from start to finish, a listening experience that is becoming increasingly rare. So as well as a host of full Beyond The Wizards Sleeve re-animations here, there are interludes, ambience, ebb and flow…each section flowing into a bigger piece. We tried many things along the way: spoken word sections, days out collecting field recordings, yet ended up letting the original songs and their beautiful arrangements and melodies guide us. There is so much happening under the surface of Sun Structures, and deep within each track, it was a pleasure to dive in and see what we could find. it inspired us to pick up our guitars, plug in our synthesisers and add some wizardry on top. Enjoy this trip. And it is a trip. Sun Structures was initially released in February and is one of the best selling releases of 2014 so far. The 12-track album, self-produced by the band’s James Bagshaw, has been a massive worldwide success.

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Temples – Hot Motion (2019) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 15, 2023 · Comments off

It is one of the brilliant facets of recorded music that while it can frame forever in time one of humanity’s most fluid art forms, those captured sounds themselves can go on to become an active launchpad for the ideas, memories, emotions and feelings of those listening. Returning with their third album, Hot Motion, Temples have not just provided a strong demonstration of this dual static/frenetic nature, but they’ve created a record that revels in this beautiful contradiction. A brilliantly crafted, thoughtfully recorded collection, the album’s propulsive, seemingly immediate songs soon reveal an impressive depth of ideas and energy with subsequent listens because, as its title warns, Hot Motion is not a record that stands still. “I’m excited for people to experience these songs for the first time,” declares singer and guitarist James Bagshaw. “They are constructed in such a way that the album should feel relatively instantaneous, but we did not water down our creative ideas. Getting that balance can be hard, perhaps on the last record on some songs we used too many layers to create depth, but making this album we discovered that depth doesn’t simply come by layering things, it can come from the intensity of an idea.” While proud of 2017’s electronically orchestrated Volcano, the trio – completed by bassist Tom Walmsley and guitarist Adam Smith – feel they have reconnected with the verve and spirit of their debut, 2014’s Sun Structures, although Hot Motion proves as unique and forward-thinking as any Temples album.

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Temples – Exotico (2023) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · June 2, 2023 · Comments off

Produced by Sean Ono Lennon, Temples’ fourth full-length album takes place in a mystical setting, an impossibly utopic island dreamed up by singer/guitarist James Bagshaw, bassist Tom Walmsley, keyboardist/guitarist Adam Smith, and drummer Rens Ottink. With its resplendent collage of psychedelia and krautrock and time-bending dream-pop, Exotico brings that world to life in crystalline detail, all while exploring an entire spectrum of existential themes: impermanence, mortality, our connection with nature and the wild immensity of the mind. Equal parts cerebral and celestial, the result is a truly immersive body of work, fully affirming Kettering-bred Temples as one of today’s most forward-thinking and endlessly inventive rock bands.

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