Sunny Side of the Mind: A Sonic Journey of the Soul – When Mountains Speak (Live streaming from The Rainbow Room) (reviewed by Dave Franklin)

When I heard that When Mountains Speak in their current form, that is, as a trio of players, was calling it a day, I must admit that I was sorry to hear it. But then, the more you think about it, the more you realise that perhaps things will be okay after all. In fact, I’m sure that they will. When I first encountered the project/band/collective (it is difficult to find a word that covers all the sonic forms), it was mainly Steven as a solo player. Even when the band form was prolific, he still made as much music under his own steam as he did as part of the gang. You could argue that not much has changed.

It does seem natural that now he is back as a solo operator, Steven would choose the medium of live streaming as an outlet for his music; it was and is, after all, music made in the moment, born of improvised adventures in sound and unplanned cosmic jams. I would argue that if he ever needs beats and bass lines to weave through the music and respond to, between the capabilities of technology (and he does incorporate some sampled ragga beats in this performance) and his address book of past collaborators, that would be an easy issue to address.

The Rainbow Room appears to be his home studio and performance space, and it is from here that this first livestream broadcasts a twenty-one-minute exploration through guitar nirvana. As always, his riffs and revelations, his guitar lines and sonic avant-gardening meander through Eastern mysticism and space rock, psychedelic oddities and prog-rock ornateness, his own creative adventurousness and free form exploration. Often, you can almost hear the synapses in his brain firing as he links one idea to another, deftly dancing from one stepping stone to the next almost at the moment they are placed before him. As we listen to this for the first time, it seems exciting and unexpected. The more exciting and unexpected thing about this performance is that it appears he is on that same journey into the unknown; it’s just that he is travelling a split second ahead of us.

Yes, you could argue that this is musician’s music, that it is one for the guitar aficionados and that it doesn’t translate to the mass audience. As we say in the UK, “No shit, Sherlock?” That is the whole point. This is the music of the prime directive….it is boldly going, it is seeking out…well, who knows, but it is looking for new sonic worlds at least, which is more than most music is doing in the current age. It isn’t going to get in the charts, but it will get in your head, at least if your brain is wired up in the right way.

What I love about Steven’s attitude is that he always finds an outlet for his music and an ever-evolving one at that. Players may come and go, and technology moves on, but the quest remains the same. Explore, create, and be original. It’s what he does. And he does it so well.