Church go further, deeper after 34 years
Not for the first time in its 34 years The Church arrived at a crossroads when Stockholm-based Marty Willson-Piper became "unavailable" to record their new album.
Willson-Piper's inventive guitar duelling with co-founder Peter Koppes has been a signature of the band's enduring neo-psychedelic rock. However, as with past upheavals, a mix of instinct and good fortune delivered The Church a solution. Enter Powderfinger's Ian Haug.
As Koppes tells it, Haug's arrival was a natural fit for the band's new album, Further/Deeper, which is their first in five years.
"When Ian was suggested, it was exactly like when Steve (Kilbey) first saw Marty, he said, 'We've got something'.
"I think the new album really reflects the combination of members in the band.
"Ian's a very secure musician (after) having five No.1 albums with Powderfinger before they broke-up. His influences were The Church and obviously a band with a name like Powderfinger had that Neil Young aesthetic of organic rock, which is in common with our pedigree as well."
Further/Deeper is a lush, sometimes dark affair peppered with space rock gems (Toy Head, Love Philtre, Let Us Go, Miami), which nestle next to sparkling, breezy efforts such as Old Coast Road and Laurel Canyon. It also marks the band's first serious tilt at a dance track (Globe Spinning) or, as Koppes calls it, "a Euro dark disco".
The album is also a shift away from 2009's excellent Untitled #23 into longer, exploratory pieces that conquer subtly, almost hypnotically.
It's the band's first opus minus Willson-Piper yet Koppes and frontman Kilbey didn't doubt their creative partnership, which stretches back before The Church formed in 1980.
"Steve and I have always sparked each other creatively," Koppes explains.
"We were creative together even when I wasn't in the band (during the mid-1990s) ... so he and I had no fear of going into this record and not coming up with the goods of a new Church album."
He says the initial reaction to Further/Deeper suggests The Church may also attract new followers to their loyal flock.
"This album is such a celebration. It's joyous, it swings, it's got rhythm - you can tap your foot to it. It's psychedelic and at the same time it's rhythmic.
"I don't why but for some reason I think people are really going to connect with it. It's much more buoyant and joyous."
THE CHURCH TOUR DATES:
October 24 - ANU Bar, Canberra
October 25 - Oxford Art Factory, Sydney
October 31 - Ormond Hall, Melbourne
November 1 - Old Museum, Brisbane
Further/Deeper (Unorthodox Records/MGM Distribution) is out now.
