Furthermore – When Mountains Speak (reviewed by Dave Franklin)

It’s funny. All this time spent writing about When Mountains Speak and this is the first time I’ve thought deeply about their chosen title. Yes, I’ve always felt that it was an interesting name, an artistic choice that seems to fit in with the blend of delicacy and soundscaping that Steven and his musical posse make. But it just struck me that it feels like a Buddhist Koan, a rhetorical question posed to a student to get them to think about a particular aspect of life or spirituality, finding the answer not being the point.

So what is the sound of mountains speaking? Is it the sound of the howling winds that batter such lofty peaks? The serene hush is more a presence than a sound that cocoons them on a clear day. Is it the random sounds of cracking and creaking as they are pushed higher or weathered away? Or is it more symbolic, more fantastic, imagining the sound of a voice, millions of year olds slow, perhaps imperceptibly so, booming yet wise, a language almost beyond language? Then, I realize that all of these aspects are mimicked, moulded, matched, and melded in the music of this strange and wonderful musical project.

Furthermore, the new two-disc album from When Mountains Speaks, like much of their music, captures this broad spectrum of sounds. In The Moment, for example, is a strange blend of squalling sounds and scattered, wandering experimental saxophone sounds, random, seemingly meandering bass lines and hushed atmospheric drones, the sound perhaps of a distant storm falling off the mountains, looming ever more significant. Yes, I’m probably looking for things that aren’t there, trying too hard, but isn’t the point of such drifting and fractured music to think deeply about what is going on? It’s like a musical koan in its own right.

Children Dance to the Elephants Whistle is the sound of Eastern meditations pushed through a Western psychedelic sonic trip, and it isn’t until we get to Howl that we find a more tethered, regular-beat-driven track, as likely to be about the titular sound as the Ginsberg poem of the same name – that’s the world we find ourselves in, a place of duality of meaning, a place of high art, but also of baser expression too.

Disc two kicks off with a beautiful piano and sax drive piece of free jazz, together enough to find traction in that world but still made from the same drifting structures and ever-evolving nature that mark it out to be typically Mountain music, as it were. Indeed, the piano is a defining feature of this second chapter, sometimes leading with recognized riffs such as Desire For You, sometimes acting as just another sonic piece in a musical jigsaw.

When Mountains Speak makes music which, on the surface at least, seems random and crazy and disjointed and unfocused. But, for me, this is its strength. Devoid of direct meaning and lack of lyrics, because it is ever evolving and unpredictable, I would say that it is music to immerse yourself in totally, music that forces the listener to…well, listen but also to dig and delve, to find meaning and think about more profound aspects of life.

Earlier, I suggested that Wehn Music Speaks makes music akin to the Buddhist teaching koans. Now, I’m sure of it.