An underwhelming electro-dub effort

The unorthodox blend of dub music and electronic music is something more and more producers are trying to master, or at least try to make listenable. Thievery Corporation try to go for another successful blend in their album Treasures from the Temple. The ninth studio album by the Washington, D.C. downtempo-dub outfit consisting of Dust Galaxy and Eric Hilton sees the duo take the more reggae-influenced direction of their 2017 release in The Temple of I & I and run entirely with it. The end result, however, leaves an unripe and bitter aftertaste in the listener’s mouth (or in this case, ears) from the fruits of Thievery Corporation’s labor.

Where this album works is in the songs with a lack of vocals. “San San Rock” charms the listener with its old-school reggae influences and invites them to further explore the album (before its eventual letdown), while taking the dub sound and applying it in earnest moderation to create a fun little opener. “Guidance,” the best track on this album, is Thievery Corporation at their most enjoyable. It’s a perfect blend of the dub sound undertaken in this album with more ambient influences and fantastic synthesizer usage; quality-wise, this track is just as good as tracks on The Mirror Conspiracy or The Cosmic Game.

Alas, where those songs deliver in providing a taste of the quality music Thievery Corporation had, tracks like “Letter to the Editor” and “Road Block” fail to deliver on those grounds. Both of those songs, while having decent original versions, feel stripped of their charm with the new remixes that were put on this album. It’s a telltale sign when an artist puts their own remix of a previous song on a new album of theirs, essentially invalidating their previous efforts that were released just 14 months prior to this album.

Most of the album’s downfall comes in the excessive usage of guest vocalists. Mr. Rif delivers underwhelming bars on “History” and “Joy Ride,” tracks that were supposed to highlight many of his strengths but failed to deliver. The vocal efforts of Racquel Jones are diminished on her two remixed tracks, “Letter to the Editor” and “Road Block.” On “History” and “Letter to the Editor,” their lyrical content is political for no apparent reason other than to be political. LouLou Ghelichkhani may be the best of the guest vocalists featured on the album, but there’s only so much she can do to try and enhance the album. “La Force de Melodie” features the standout vocal performance, assisted by production that actually enhances and plays to both Thievery Corporation’s and Ghelichkhani’s strong suits.

The main problem with this album, however, is that Thievery Corporation is crafting music not for themselves, or the Thievery Corporation name, but for the artists that they feature on their tracks. In terms of album aesthetic, this feels a lot more like The Neptunes Present… Clones in both the content and quality. While Pharrell Williams and Chad Hugo were able to produce some of the early ’00s most exciting and fun production, that album eschewed all the things that made The Neptunes renowned in that decade’s music scene. Treasures from the Temple is no different. There are efforts on this album which show glimpses of hope and the Thievery Corporation that put them on the map, but instead sees both Dust Galaxy and Eric Hilton play to the strengths of the artists they feature, which degrades the quality of the album. It’s a disappointing effort from recording artists who should know better.