The Utopia Strong / Stereocilia (live at Strange Brew)

Bristol
16 June 2022

Unfortunately got to the venue a little late, but luckily managed to pick up Stereocilia’s set somewhere at the midway point.

Fresh from his support slot for William Basinski at St George’s, that guitar of his was ace, caught in a filigree of looped frets, melodically burning like car headlights across a series of brooding landscapes. A textually torn building up of layers full of dramatic swings and dissipating tune, constantly overlaid in e-bowed buzz and frenetic strum that made me wish I’d got there sooner.

Been meaning to see The Utopia Strong in action for a while now, and they don’t disappoint. Right from the offset they pick up from the sterling foundation Stereocilia purveyed, dipping into a delicate drip of electronics. Steve Davis’s suitcase of modular spaghetti and Michael York’s slim-line desk and pedals coax some divine parabolics into existence; Kavus Torabi working the harmonium’s lungs, sending a curling drone rippling through that amazing sense of space.

A corduroying cosmic that gave you a fascinating insight into how they create their sounds. I’m recognising snippets from the new album here and there, but tonight it is treated more like a template to improvise out of than a straight-jacketed road map. Suddenly, Michael introduces this gorgeous melodic from some unassuming white plastic box, leisure lines that float over Kavus’s e-bowed guitar, Michael adjusting its accents to hook into that shimmering mirage, a shoaling free-fall that glints like flowing water caught in warm sunshine.

Steve’s hands are in a constant state of adjustment – reactive to the whole, a perfectly balanced beast which they make look so effortless and the focus between the three is so incredible. A pleased smile breaks across Mr Davis’s face a number of times as he slips on his pre-check headphones, secretly introducing new flavours to the mix, then nodding with satisfaction to the alchemic outcomes, Kavus’s vocals plying a vapourising howl that’s like a decompressing memory scooped up by the buttery magnificence of the other two.

At this point you have no idea who’s doing what, so many converging shapes and bleeding boundaries at play, then a Jimi Hendrix-like Kavus curves into it with some soothing pyrotechnics screwdrivering the frets to produce this raga-like carousel to which Mr York colours with the animal-skin drone of mediæval bagpipes.

In fact, Michael provides loads of extra texturals to the proceedings, pivoting a crisp contrast to the synthesised sizzle, and later he serpents in some exquisite flute, a decorative detonation that scissors superbly into Kavus’s aerosoled vocals that sound like disturbed dolphins. After spring-boarding plenty of surprises, they finally slow it all down to a whisper and the crowd go wild for the appreciative window, followed by silence.

Just when you think it’s all over, the trio return, all Brian Eno-esque blossom and more so, a jewelled disposition with hints of early Tangerine Dream as things float around untethered are netted in cursive swoops of an active ambience frosted in divergent daisy chains to which a pearling beat takes hold. A chopped up percussive that sounds like a woodpecker asymmetrically churned – danceables that gets us all nodding blindly along.

The bagpipes return whilst Torabi wanders the stage with his guitar, the sound slowly becoming an arched back, traumatically tilting as Mr York mincemeats the fuck out of his pipes; then suddenly slams on the brakes to thunderous applause.

Honestly, they need to release a live album like yesterday — phenomenal (fingers crossed the person on the sound-desk hit record).

-Michael Rodham-Heaps-