Matt Stevens – Lucid

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Some albums are musically beautiful. And that music beauty is something that you cannot push into a record, it comes spontaneously. Complex structures, odd-time signatures and all that technicality are great, but from time to time there appears to be an album that surpasses everything with its own, inner prettiness.

Matt Stevens is a well-known name in the underground progressive rock circles as a solo artist, guitarist of The Fierce and the Dead, prog enthusiast and generally a great guy with a guitar. He has been releasing solo albums since 2008, starting with the same year’s Echo. In the meantime he released three more full-lenghts and one EP. His new studio effort, Lucid, is his most mature and most carefully crafted outing to date. Inspired by Celtic Frost, Mahavishnu Orchestra, Jesu, King Crimson and Peter Gabriel, this work of creative freakery announces a semi-lyrical, coherent work by guitarist who is accompanied with great cast of musicians. For the purpose of recording Lucid, Stevens brought in Pat Mastelotto and Stuart Marshall on drums, Lorenzo Feliciati, Charlie Cawood and Kev Feazey on bass, Jem Godfrey and Emmett Elvin on keyboards, Chrissie Caulfield on violin, Jon Hart on vibe, and Nicholas Wyatt Duke provided spoken word.

Lucid is raw, stripped-down and organic, but equally intricate and vigorous. Stevens is a good balancer between electrics and acoustics, always pushing the creative envelope forward by taking the risk and going into unknown. That often means an unexpected change in the album’s flow – something that comes with the mentioned influences. Indeed, from the Celtic Frost driven Oxymoron to a singer-songwriter structured The Other Side, Crimsonian The Ascent, to out-of-the-blue K.E.A, Stevens is constantly getting ahead of himself. Clocking to almost 12 minutes, The Bridge possibly employs each of the elements together. It’s heavy, experimental, drone, acoustic and ambient chunk that intuitively sums up all the greatness of the record.

Lucid, besides the splendid amount of material it carries, is showing a remarkable talent of an artist whose efforts are highly appreciated. Matt Stevens has put out an album that, simple as it is, shows that music still knows how to be unpretentious and beautiful.

Lucid was released by Esoteric Antenna / Cherry Red Records and is available from this location.

Tracklist:

1. Oxymoron
2. Flow
3. Unsettled
4. The Other Side
5. The Ascent
6. Coulrophobia
7. Lucid
8. KEA
9. Street and Circus
10. The Bridge
11. A Boy

Line-up:

* Matt Stevens (Fierce and The Dead) – guitars

With:

* Pat Mastelotto (King Crimson) – drums
* Stuart Marshall (Fierce And The Dead) – drums
* Lorenzo Feliciati (Naked Truth) – bass
* Charlie Cawood (Knifeworld) – bass
* Kev Feazey – bass
* Jem Godfrey (Frost) – keyboards
* Emmett Elvin (Chrome Hoof / Guapo) – keyboards
* Chrissie Caulfield (Helicopter Quartet / Crippled Black Phoenix) – violin
* Jon Hart – vibe
* Nicholas Wyatt Duke (Trojan Horse) – spoken word

Links:

http://www.mattstevensguitar.com/

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