The Temperatures again prove that they are one of London's most spasmodically captivating outfits with the release of their first LP, Ymir (Heat Retention). The previous 7" aktion has been good (particularly the debut 7" on 4th Harmonic), but this record drags the whole drum/bass/duo concept into a new sludgier realm. They don't so any of the proto-prog calesthetics of Lightning Bolt, but prefer to just roll around in muzz. Which is a fairly admirable alternative, eh?

TEMPERATURES: Ymir LP (HEAT RETENTION)

I'm glad T. Moore talked about this LP for his "Favorite New Music" section of Pitchfork's Guest List, because I'd been listening to it for a couple weeks myself and still wasn't really sure who or what it was. There was no info on the record or the package it came in other than the band name and title, silk-screened on the back cover in a slightly confusing triangle shape. All I had to go on was name of the label, Heat Retention Records, because it was typewritten on the back, and I already knew 'em from their excellent recent Church of Yuh LP release by the George Steeltoe Ensemble. After listening to this new LP once, I thought it might involve some of the same players, because it also combines noise and jazz in some rather daring and surprising ways, but, according to Mr. Moore, Temperatures are a duo from the UK, and the more I listen, the more obvious it becomes that they are totally onto their own thing. At first, side one of Ymir was almost too much, some sort of shuddering noise piece that moves very slow chord changes through a severe filter of obfuscation. It took me awhile to notice that some live free jazz drumming was also in the mix, somehow eventually taking the whole thing into tranced-out slobbering HC song territory, and then ending it all with seance noise over which the singer dude keeps saying shit. Whoah, and side two was perfect right away, starting with a hot double-bass-and-drums steeplechase not unlike a William Parker and Hamid Drake duo before morphing into some burning noise with more bizarre hardcore vibes. Apparently they only made 100 of these, so jeez, I feel lucky and I'd definitely like to hear more...

http://www.blastitude.com/26/

ED PINSENT wrote:

Last heard by us in 2005 with their brilliant private press EP "Too Hot To Handle" / "Too Cold To Hold" which was a true ’scorcher-maroo’. They’re a London-based guitar and drums duo, now spreading their ferocious wings over the length of two sides of a long player and turning in a much more complex and fascinating racket than their first primal, angry EP of brutal noise-thrash. Somehow they are contriving a much more denatured, weirded-up sound - the recording quality here is not lo-fi, distorted or treated, but it still projects as just plain weird, radiating bizarro-beams across the county. What have they done to it? Agitated and twitchy, they’re playing like two crazed zombies stuck in neutral, creating hand-knitted tape loops out of their own primitivist styles. I could listen to this mesmerizing, growling, monotonous grind for 100 years. While we may look for some surface resemblance to Brooklyn duo Mouthus, I think Temperatures are already finding their own voice to the extent that they could give said Mouthus or even Yellow Swans some serious competition. Temperatures can do noise, but this is very sophisticated and dynamic, at the same time exploring some difficult mixed emotions which are hard to name. It seems to be something to do with finding ways around blocked communications, overcoming frustrated gestures. Live and in real time, the duo can be heard to take on this semi-heroic struggle on behalf of the human race, and emerge at the other end drenched with the sweat of their efforts - perhaps not clutching the trophy of success, nor dispensing pat answers to the problematic questions of life, but certainly enriched by their experience. You can be enriched too - snarf up a copy of this dark boiler-bash recording, housed in its murky screenprinted sleeve, and work out those constipated feelings via the cleansing purge of guitar and drum noise.

THE SOUND PROJECTOR ISSUE 16 (2007) P.142

Pitchfork review by Thurston Moore:

Favorite New Band

That’s like reaching into a grab-bag because there’s so many at every given time or day that I’m hearing. There’s always bands popping up that are doing something I really like. There’s this duo from the UK that I really like: Temperatures. I don’t know too much about them but I think they’re just two guys from the UK. I sort of, well it’s one of those things where you get your information through this underground network of noise and avant-garde, weird music that’s happening all the time now. And I saw their name a couple of times, and then I saw the Temperatures album, the one on Heat Retention, at Hospital Records in New York. On the wall, it’s like, Temperatures LP, limited edition, 100 copies, and the cover is kind of this rough paper and really homemade with silkscreen on it. Very little information. Just "Temperatures". It’s the kind of thing that makes me buy records-- all of those aspects. Like, an intriguing name, only making enough records that they know that they can sell in a couple of months and not having any lying around in their basement in boxes, and the most minimal of information-- just play the fucking record and that’s all the information you need. They did two 7"s themselves, where the sleeves where very homemade. I knew it would be something really extreme, noise-duo kind of stuff. We were playing it the other day and it was pretty cool. It’s really this dark-hole of noise-playing. It’s actually really distinctive in a way amongst that genre, because there’s a lot of standardized tropes in the noise genre that people fall into-- which I don’t mind, I like the idea that this is traditional way of playing in that world, but it’s always cool to hear something like this where you can’t really slot it into those things.

Read the full article here.

Monday, October 01 2007 @ 01:00 AM PDT

Contributed by: empty j
Artist: Temperatures
Title: Ymir
Genre: Experimental / Noise Rock / Improvisation

Both sides untitled

The drum and bass duo format has yielded some pretty tasty fruit over the past two decades. Groups from Japan’s Ruins to Rhode Island’s Lightning Bolt have proven that you don’t need to fill a sonic void in order to have some full-spectrum exploratory rock. England’s Temperatures don’t play rock per se, but are definitely capable of rocking. James (drums/synth) and Peter (bass/voice) have more in common with the U.S. duo Eloe Omoe than they do with someone like Godheadsilo. That is to say that the emphasis is more on unabashed improvisatory sound-sculpting than it is on prog-rock fuelled meter changes. These two side-long untitled pieces go hither and yon to places, in the band’s own words, that are ’too hot to handle, too cold to hold.’ Best to retain your heat while you can I suppose.

The first side plods along with some rumbles and throbs amongst some skittering trap-work and a bit of menacing synthesizer. I’m imagining an early Faust after-hours session with Zeppi Diermaier and Rudolf Sosna exhausting the last bit of whatever chemicals have inhabited their minds and bodies that day. A two-note figure lays the groundwork for some scrapes and barbed noise that the drummer freely extemporizes all over with a gratuitous amount of cymbal activity. About halfway through the drums threaten to usher in a norm of periodicity with some deft playing that feels as though we’re taking off into familiar rock territory. It turns out to be a tease as we get treated to an about-face into something that has more in common with vintage no wave or perhaps even Lake Of Dracula. The side concludes with amplitude-modulated throbbing bass, cheap-mic vocals and some feedback. This ties up the proceedings nicely and gives the piece a sense of cohesion.

The flipside kicks off with some frantic bass noodling and tight but free kit shenanigans. Just when you think that these guys can’t keep this up any longer, they diverge into some pulse-based jamming. The sense of temporal continuity is however fucked with royally. James’ elastic take on meter coupled with the pitch-bent strings of the bass come across like a restless tape-op ever so slightly retarding the tape’s journey across the recording head. When Peter’s vocals kick in, it’s as if we’re inhabiting the magnetic particles of some long-lost bootleg of The Fall (circa early 80s) on a night when Mark E. Smith has had just the right combination of lager and amphetamines. From here the duo ride on some free rock wave for a bit and settle into what sounds like a coffeehouse gig gone all wrong. Nice.

Overall this LP has a great sense of flux. The fidelity may be less than stellar, but the black on brown printing and shiny black vinyl are quite appealing. Temperatures’ music is like none other and therein lies the greatest appeal of all. If that interests you, then you should act quickly because there are only 100 of these in circulation. I need to water my plants. Have a blessed day.

Heathen Harvest website

Posted by Martin on the Swedish Nurse blog:

... first full-length by this mysterious south London duo (see previous post here), one long untitled piece each side, downcast and sinister thick bass throbbing and rolling drumming on the first side, with vocals that sound like a broken man trying to explain what really happened to a hostile interrogator towards the end of the piece.

The second side is noisier, starting with their ’familiar’ sound of knotted, hammered bass notes and drum clatter that breaks down after a few minutes before exploding into some terrifically noisy interplay with -it has to be said - Mark E Smith-style ranting before the yearning, thrilling conclusion. These boys don’t give much away, with the abstract titles and imagery, so just enjoy this night bus ride through hell. This is fantastic, abject subterranean stuff.