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Review: The Steve Hillage Band/The Utopia Strong, O2 Academy
A few days ago, The Utopia Strong appeared on Breakfast telly. That’s not because the sofa-dwellers have developed a welcome interest in prog rock, but because someone at the Beeb realised that the trio’s Steve Davis is the Steve Davis – six times world snooker champion. Clearly, the potential for a funny ‘skateboarding duck’ news item, making fun of Davis’s ‘boring’ persona, was irresistible.
In fact, Davis’s interest in leftfield progressive rock is a longstanding one. He once promoted a London gig by great French proggers Magma purely because he wanted to see them. The Utopia Strong teams him with his old chum/Gong frontman Kavus Tovabi and Michael J. York, formerly of Coil, for what’s billed as experimental Kosmische music. On stage at the Academy, each chap is hunched over his own box of tricks. Bespectacled Davis, headphones pitched at a jaunty angle, twiddles with his analogue modular synthesizer; Torabi contributes non-lyric vocals and occasionally reaches for his guitar, as though channelling Edgar Froese from early Tangerine Dream; and York augments the sound with a variety of wind instruments, notably the bagpipes.
is needed now More than ever
There’s no talk whatsoever. Visually, it’s rather like that 2007 show at the venue now known as Crofters Rights, when Kosmische pioneers Michael Rother and Dieter Moebius performed in the back room, watched by an admiring Julian Cope in full leather regalia. All of which forces us to concentrate on the music: a lengthy, hypnotic, free-flowing continuous piece that appears to be mostly improvised, with multiple loops, and is anything but boring. That said, this would work better in a club setting or as a post-Hillage chillout set rather than a warm-up act.
On the face of it, this is rather an odd tour for Mr. Hillage to be doing. He’s always been a restless creative spirit, refusing to stay in the box the media has assigned him and leaving many of us behind with his ravey-davey System 7 adventures. But now he’s billed as playing material exclusively from his first four solo albums, in what could be construed as an exercise in pure nostalgia. All the punters here tonight would no doubt prefer to see it as a timely celebration of great guitar music.
Given that Hillage was the young guitar hotshot with Gong in the 1970s, there’s a certain irony in the fact that his band for this tour is the moonlighting current younger incarnation of Gong. But the fact is that no one is better placed to do this driving music justice than these guys. They could probably play the entire set on their own, but seem delighted to be cast a sidekicks on this occasion. The “Oh no . . . Steve Hillage!” Young Ones intro clip (filmed just up the road, lest we forget) is retained from the last tour, with the great man appearing on stage just as Neil the hippy bludgeons Electrick Gypsies, and they swiftly launch into that definitive cover of George Harrison’s acid trip classic, It’s All Too Much, accompanied by a suitably retina-frazzling lightshow.
There are seven musicians on stage, including three guitarists (Kavus Torabi pulling a double shift tonight), but Steve’s partner Miquette Giraudy’s banks of keyboards are rightly positioned upfront. She’s no Linda McCartney figure, but a talented musician in her own right, who makes a vital contribution to the trademark Hillage psychedelic sound. The new arrangements also offer Ian East plenty to do, which is particularly impressive given that the original songs weren’t exactly overburdened with sax or woodwind.
In addition to those obvious selections (Hurdy Gurdy Man, etc), the setlist digs deep into the catalogue, providing a real treat for long-term fans. Rather brilliantly, it also goes off-piste on occasion, including a scintillating cover of Kevin Ayers’ Why Are We Sleeping, on which the young Hillage played. “If you liked that, you’re going to love this,” he announces on returning for a lengthy encore that kicks off with a splendid cover of The Move’s I Can Hear the Grass Grow (a top five hit in 1967, also covered by Status Quo) and takes in the inevitable Glorious Om Riff.
It’s been suggested that this could be the last time Hillage tours this stuff. Let’s hope not. There’s no shortage of hippies, young and old, who are overjoyed to hear it all again.
Read more: Metal & Prog Picks: April 2023
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