Silence And Utopia

Halle St Peter's is a former church sitting in the middle of Ancoats, one of Manchester's regeneration success stories, a former post- industrial wasteland of derelict mills and an unloved retail park now buzzing with flats, restaurants and young people. The former church is now the rehearsal space for the Halle Orchestra and as a result the room is acoustically perfect. On Thursday night The Utopia Strong (pictured above) played there as part of their current UK tour with support at this gig from Lines Of Silence (whose new album I wrote about on Friday here). 

Lines Of Silence are a trio, Dave Little on guitar and FX pedals, Andrea on guitar, cymbal and vocals and Dave Clarkson on electronics. The Manchester/ Todmorden band have been around for years and their latest album, Lines Of Opposition!, is out on Sprechen, a Manchester label with a fine back catalogue (ACR, Psychederek, Lindstrom, The Utopia Strong, The Thief Of Time, Steve Cobby and Causeway have all released records on Sprechen). 

Lines Of Silence kick off with some pulsing, motorik krautrock, the drums and bass thumping away from the table of synths and FX on the right and the twin guitars channeling Michael Rother and Sterling Morrison, with recent single Lines In Opposition ringing out loud and clear. Mid- set they stretch out, a ten minute ambient/ drone epic, Andrea tapping the splash cymbal and Dave Little conjuring a storm of noise from his guitar. They stick with the drone/ soundscape tracks, longer, experimental cosmische tracks backed by trippy visuals and a 1950s film of some passengers on a bus finding themselves in some kind of existential trouble. The close to sold out crowd of over a hundred people respond warmly and Lines Of Silence have won some new fans. 

Lines Of Silence's album Lines In Opposition! is here. 

The Utopia Strong are also a  three piece who formed at Glastonbury Festival in 2018 - as everyone surely knows former six- time snooker world champion Steve Davies plays modular synth in the group. He sits at a table of synths, cables and wires, headphones on, concentrating intently. In the centre is Kavus Torabi, his shock of hair, velvet jacket and black jeans giving the impression he'd be equally at home playing in a spacerock band in Ladbroke Groove in the mid- 70s. Kavus plays harmonium, synth, electric guitar and bass and provides wordless vocals (he also plays with Gong). On the right is Michael J. York- synths, FX, bells, gong, snake charmer's pipe, clarinet and bagpipes. Yes, bagpipes. They play for forty minutes, a one track set that flows through several stages- there are long drone sections underpinned by ebbing and flowing modular synths with the harmonium swelling and wheezing followed by some distinctly separate pieces. At one point there is a section where Kavus stats chanting wordlessly, a two note choral sound over the ambient soundscape, and (especially in the setting of a church) it would surely be recognised by the members of a 13th century monastic order, devotional music. Later on, with the snake charmer's pipe winding a discordant melody into the sonic stew, we could be in the souk in North Africa at any time in the last thousand years. 

The Utopia Strong sound both ancient and modern with strong echoes of mid 70s Tangerine Dream. As Kavus straps on the bass guitar and prods away at a two note riff, swaying with his eyes closed and Steve Davies builds a wall of drone noise, and Michael drags his beaters round the gong's edge to add a growing ringing sound, it's easy to drift away, transported into a meditative state or begin dwelling on deeper matters and life choices. At others, when the music changes, you snap back into the room and consider what you've got to do in the morning- and at other times, the music is all there is, the enjoyment of the sound an end in itself. The set builds and towards the end Michael picks up the bagpipes and begins to play- not the cliched pipers in kilts type of bagpipe music, something much older and odder, a cosmische and psychedelic ritual. The encore sees Steve plug his leads back into the modular device while Kavus and Michael kneel on the stage floor, playing a various sized hand bells, the chiming and tapping a beautifully chilled out way to finish. 

This is from 2025's Doperider album, Harpies. 

The Utopia Strong are in Northampton tonight and then onto play Exeter, London, Deal, Luton, Glasgow, Huddersfield, Cambridge, St Leonards, Colchester and Leicester and if you can get to one of those gigs, I'd highly recommend it.