The Dutch space rockers Temple Fang is one of the many examples of bands caught by circumstances they had no way of controlling. The band was formed in Amsterdam, born from the ashes of Death Alley and incorporating members from Mühr, but due to covid restrictions only got few chances to play live, ending with 3 seated shows in Db’s Utrecht on 13-12-2020, a day before the whole country was forced into lockdown again. Worn down by a year of struggling to keep the band going in the midst of a pandemic, they decided to abandon the project entirely and take a break from music, not even sure if they wanted to continue Temple Fang.
When their sound engineer Niek Manders send the band a rough mix of recordings he had made of the shows, the decision was made to close this chapter of TF with a second live record (Quite unusual their debut had been a live recording). Even though they had played most of those songs for the first time and the quality of the recordings was rough, there was definitely a vibe there and it was all they had captured of this new material.
The band headed to Galloway studio’s in Nijmegen to mix, but producer Sebastiaan van Bijlevelt ambushed them with a totally different idea, he was dead set on taking these recordings as a base to build an album onto. Many months later, they emerged from the studio unsure of what to do with the record. They decided to shelve the project and move on.
Johan Broeder of brand new label Electric Spark had gotten wind of the project and after hearing it, tried over many months to convince the band to release it. He finally did, so “Fang Temple” was released digitally and as a double 180gr vinyl with Gatefold pre-order limited to a total of 600 copies. Vinyls are expected to be ready for delivery sometime in the spring of 2022.
The release is a last statement of the band and it will not get any promotion and neither will they tour the album.
Artist: Temple Fang
Album: Live At Merleyn, Fang Temple
Year: 2020, 2021 (2022)
Label: None (self-released), Electric Spark
Style: Space Rock, Psychedelic Rock
Format: mp3/320
Dennis Duijnhouwer: Bass, Vocals, Guitars, Synth
Jevin de Groot: Guitars-Vocals, Synth, Percussion
Ivy van der Veer: Guitars, Piano, Percussion
Jasper van den Broeke: Drums
Live At Merleyn (Nijmegen 24-10-2019)
Tracklist
01 Gemini / Silky Servants 20:14
02 Not The Skull 19:46
Fang Temple
Tracklist
01 Let It Go / When We Pray 21:54
02 A Strange Place To Land 18:01
03 The Knife 17:42
04 Not The Skull 22:15