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Locations: Chicago // Kansas City • Follow: Twitter // SoundCloud

Iris Temple is a name you might not have heard, regardless of how tapped into the Chicago music world you might think you are.

Made up of producer Quinn Cochran and vocalist Aura (who is also named Quinn), the two craft foggy cloud abstractions that float between the valleys of lucid dreaming and sleep talking. At times hip-hop, at times spoken word poetry, and at times baritone soul, the duo stand out in a saturated and highly competitve market. Although the two released a six song EP last summer, they currently only have three songs available to the masses.

That being said, the two members have been hard at work within Chicago. Quinn Cochran was found on Beach Jesus' debut Two Weeks Vacation and he most recently produced the majority of Jabril Power's debut EP, Skin. Aura also has a feature on that project, as he provides a verse on the final track "Yes". On that track, Aura has one of my favorite lines of recent memory:

“I’ve been on uncharted islands, I’ve been under clouds of stars / I’ve been one thousand miles up, never fallen quite that far.””

— Aura

Iris Temple is made up of two artists who are technically not even rookies yet, as they only have a handful of tracks made available to the public. Regardless, Iris Temple is a name that you should get hip to, as they are summoning a sound not prominent in Chicago. A sound that is unique and highly enjoyable. They stray away from confines and expectations, blending synth pop with guitar solos and hallucinatory poetry. It's less bars over a simple loop and more of a canvas full of endless paint.

Perhaps my favorite of their small portfolio is the track “The Aether”, which takes the group deep into orbit, inside of a rocket ship where they are “hazy off this space dust.” Imaginative fiction within hip-hop that seems to take direct inspiration from cartoons and sci-fi and mesh them with personal experiences and raw emotions.

At the end of last month, they tweeted that they were working on a new EP, one that we hope will arrive sooner than later. Until then, be sure to enjoy our 'Essential Listens' playlist on Iris Temple and let us know what you think in the comment section below.