As on his Love Is album of 2020, Steve Howe plays keyboards as well as bass (alongside his son Dylan on drums). In fact, he says Guitarscape is informed by his purchase of a Novation Summit synthesiser, on which he discovered tones and chord structures unlike those he would come up with on a guitar.
The result is an album that exudes a hybrid air. But although synth lines were the starting point, this remains a guitarist’s album at heart, with a lot on display across 14 short pieces.
Howe’s fluid and delicate playing, mainly on electric guitars but also acoustic (and on some tracks both) ranges from prog to ambient to jazz. There’s an almost Far Eastern feel in the slow and delicate Gone West, and echoes of Soon (from Yes’s Relayer) in closing track Steel Breeze.
Nothing hangs around long enough to become boring, and several tracks end a little too soon.
