Review Summary: A drop in form but still a solid record
The fourth album by the Tea Party is a really solid rock record with plenty of big hooks and energy. The only problem with it is that it followed in the footsteps of three great albums, Splendor Solis, The Edges Of Twilight and Transmission and as such it cant quite compete.
From those first three albums we had come to know The Tea Party as a brooding and experimental band which combined their commanding rock performance with Eastern and world music influences to create a very unique and almost mystical sound. They created what many (including myself) deemed to be their masterpiece, The Edges Of Twilight four years earlier. It exemplified the above description of their sound and conjured up visions of haunting, majestic landscapes and the whole album had a sort of possessed mystique to it. It was very well regarded and its stocks have increased in time, a hallmark of a great piece of work. So what does a band do after creating such a superb discography so early in their career? Do they continue on the same path and try to replicate their early sound? In this case they made a more accessible and conventional rock album that partially distances them from their previous three LP’s. There are still remnants of their Eastern and world music tinge but far less than the previous three albums. Whether the decision to change their sound was a deliberate one to gain more fans and a broader audience or whether they just wanted to try something new with their sound is unclear; The Tea Party were never ones to conform, however they were a very underrated band and were somehow ignored in the U.S. I don’t think anyone really knows the motivation behind their transition.
Whatever the reasoning, Triptych is still a solid album for an immensely talented band. The motivation for the album title is unclear, there seems to be one underlying theme of religion, whether it’s all a Great Big Lie or it feels like Heaven Coming Down. It is sometimes difficult to tell how he feels about what he sings as the mood and lyrics, sometimes ambiguous, vary from track to track. I tend to think his musings on religion are negative but that’s just me, it could represent any number of things to other people. From a sound perspective, once you get used to the change, it is very catchy and solid. There are still many more instruments used than most other bands, especially three pieces. There is great melody throughout and the vocals are very commanding in parts and gentle and fragile in others. On Triptych, as with other Tea Party albums, it is easy to forget they were a three piece, which is a big nod toward their talents as musicians, the vast array of different sounds in their records is one of their biggest strengths as a band. Triptych though just seems to lack some of the imagination and inspiration of other, both earlier and later Tea Party records. It gets into a promising groove and just stays there rather than going off into all sorts of weird and wonderful tangents like their best stuff does, but maybe that’s due to the nature of the sound they were going for. Either way, it feels like a more sterile version of The Tea Party, which is still anything but sterile in the context of many other bands.
Overall, this album is a matter of taste, The Tea Party always did what they did with a great deal of skill. I personally prefer the more atmospheric nature of their earlier work to this more rock influenced sound as I think it allowed more creativity. If you are a big Tea Party fan then this is a must, if not, start with Edges Of Twilight, Splendor Solis, Transmission or The Interzone Mantras.
