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Edena Gardens — Quintessence
(El Paraiso EPR085, 2026, 2LP)

by Peter Thelen, Published 2026-10-06

Quintessence Cover art

On their fifth studio album, Edena Gardens makes a grand statement that seems to be what all previous releases were leading up to. The album’s six long tracks are grouped into four parts that take us to the limit of the LP medium (and this is a 2LP set), nearly eighty minutes when all is said and done. The personnel is as before, with Causa Sui drummer Jakob Skøtt, bassist and guitarist Martin Rude (from London Odense Ensemble, Sun River and others) and guitarist Nicklas Sørensen from Papir, with Jonas Munk of Causa Sui handling the engineering, mix and mastering. The essence of all six tracks is finding a groove, which the band seems to get to intuitively, then holding on to it for a bit, allowing it to morph into something new within the same general context, flowing with the changes, and then setting it free. The eighteen-minute opener “Nigredo” probably exemplifies this as well as any other piece here, slowly morphing through numerous changes while holding that steady pacing. Some pieces, like the ten minute “Into Citrinitas” are a bit more fusion informed, and would fit nicely on an album like Billy Cobham’s Spectrum, while others like “Calcified Bone & Weathered Stone” slow the pace down and give every member a chance to shine brightly. Like all Edena Gardens before it, there are no vocals anywhere, only allowing the instruments do the singing. The bristling pace laid down by Skøtt on “Earth Blemish” along with Rude’s frisky bass leaves ample space for some brilliant improvisation by Sørensen on one measure after the next. The album’s shortest track, the seven-plus minute “Amber Deposits” walks down the paseo with swagger as the band twists and turns from one powerful idea to the next, but perhaps it’s the 22-minute immersive closer (all of side 4) “The Vermillion Quintessence” that allows the listener to wander free outside of any expectations, the band slowly developing ideas as they come to pass. If one hasn’t heard anything by Edena Gardens up to this point, Quintessence would be a great place to start exploring.

Filed under: New releases, 2026 releases

Related artist(s): Edena Gardens

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