The Quiet Temple has a brilliant new track entitled “The Last Opium Den (On Earth)” available for streaming today. The group is an amorphous collective helmed by Soulsaver’s Rich Machin and multi-instrumentalist Duke Garwood, and it includes a rotating cast of members from Spiritualized, Stereolab, and Julian Cope. The Quiet Temple will release their self-titled debut on July 5th via Wichita Recordings.
Recorded at Peter Gabriel‘s Real World studio in the Autumn of 2017, the group describes their upcoming effort as an “experimental cosmic-psyche-jazz-Krautrock-post-punk-dub record.” Seeking an improvisatory approach, Machin reports that the band went into the studio without having their ideas already mapped out. He explains: “One of the big things I wanted to achieve with this record was breaking away from things being super planned out…It was incredibly stressful at first, but once you realize it works it’s actually a really nice way to work.”
That’s not to say, though, that the band operated without guidance before recording in the studio. Machin informs us that members spent time absorbing three key jazz records: Larry Young‘s Lawrence of Newark, Marcus Belgrave‘s Gemini and Noah Howard‘s The Black Ark. Letting the mood and approach of those albums guide them, but wary of making a jazz record, the band utilized an improvisational strategy while taking full advantage of their studio environment to create a hands-on, dub influenced sound.
Machin also notes that the group attempted to “de-jazz” things in an effort to find a more Velvet Underground-like groove. That groove definitely takes precedence on “The Last Opium Den (On Earth),” but once this track breaks thru its initially misty veil, it might also bring to mind a more filled out version of Morphine. Cinematic and heady, “The Last Opium Den On Earth)” is quite a groovy place to find yourself should those end days be near.
