The Peep Tempel

Following on from the success of their first album and abundant praise for their live shows, Melbourne’s The Peep Tempel returned to the studio to produce their latest release, Tales.

The band which has had many iterations throughout its lifetime, started out as a two-piece “jam session over a few beers” that consisted of singer-songwriter Blake Scott and drummer Steven Carter which eventually grew and produced 7-inch singles. The band then added Matthew Duffy as a bassist for their debut studio album, which received widespread critical acclaim. More recently the band continued this process of evolution and their signature sound once again changed with the addition of new bassist Stewart Rayner.

“This album isn’t as fast and furious as the first which was deliberately a lot more frantic, we even bumped up the tempos of some tracks to add to the nervous energy whereas this record has a few more tracks that are groove-based, which is something we’ve never explored,” says frontman Blake Scott.

With this being their second full-length album and given the altered makeup of the band, The Peep Tempel were bound to face some obstacles during the recording process.

“With Stewie as our new bass player we had to work to get the transition from the first album to the EP – which Stewie was a part of – to this album to sound right, so it was a little more difficult. We got a fair way into it then culled a few songs, which made the direction more clear and set in stone,” says Scott.

Despite all of these obstacles and changes the very distinct Australian rock and roll sound urging listeners to dance continues to shine through whilst also keeping the bands well known humour – which is albeit slightly darker this time round.

The Peep Tempel have come to be known as a great live act, which is as Scott says, “noisy, high energy and something we’ve always tried to pride ourselves on. We love getting people going, getting the blood running and getting people moving.”

The Sydney leg of the tour will be the second last stop, but the band assures fans that they will continue to bring the energy and will have sorted out any kinks to the show along the way, so this could very well be the best show of the bunch. (JA)

Oct 24, The Lansdowne Hotel, 2-6 City Rd, Chippendale, free, (02) 8218 2333