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That was the Arzachel album in 1969. What happened was we [Dave Stewart, Mont Campbell and Clive Brooks] developed our band Uriel when we were still at school. We got pretty good and started getting a lot of gigs. Mont and Dave really wanted to leave the school and do it professionally there and then. I didn’t feel I was in a position to do that for various reasons, partly connected with the relationship with my parents and the fact that they really wanted me to go to university in Canterbury. His career is prolific and amazingly constant over almost 4 decades - from Arzachel through Gong and his solo work to his more recent collaborations and explorations into electronic dance music with System 7, there is the single constant that can be readily extracted from everything he lays his

The complexity on FISH RISING is off the charts and has been referred to as the psychedelic version of the Mahavishnu Orchestra Shamal' before making his own exit and after the success of his debut solo album FISH RISING which was recorded and released electronic dance duo, System 7. He also teamed up with ambient musician Evan Marc in 2008 to record the Fish Rising" is an album full of psychedelic delights, featuring super soar-away soloing, spacey New Age ambience, dynamic I would award this album a complete Masterpiece rating, but sadly, the songs themselves let the album down heavily - Exhibit A: (vocoder) "Way down below the oceans, we'll be riding on our emotions..." (Sea Nature); Exhibit B: "Palm Trees" (say no more...)Gong were visually potent as a live experience, too. Capering in his wispy, gingery beard and pointy hat, the singer resembled Catweazle (from the children’s TV series about an 11th-century wizard). Hillage’s arrival as lead guitarist allowed Allen to concentrate on what he called “audience connection and ritual theatrics”. Another focal figure on stage was Smyth, who, recalls Howlett, “wore fantastic costumes and projected this earth-mother-slash-witch trip. She couldn’t really sing, but with the ‘space whispers’ she developed this whole new style of vocal that didn’t exist before. She’d incant poetry and spin out certain words with long echo, using a special switch on her microphone.” Although the locals tolerated the hairy oddball visitors, the druggy escapades indirectly led to Gong losing the house. “We had a raid, but it wasn’t the police, it was the customs, looking for carnet infringements, equipment we’d shipped over,” says Hillage. “But they found some drug paraphernalia. It all got a bit difficult.” So Gong moved to another communal setup in Oxfordshire, near Virgin’s Manor studio, where they recorded You, the final instalment of the Radio Gnome Invisible Trilogy. Live Herald followed later that year with some fine in-concert performances from the last couple of years. The original double LP version included a side of studio material, which has since been replaced on CD by another live recording. While this made it more consistent, it lost us Hillage’s ‘punk’ song ‘1988 Aktivator’. Inspired by a surfeit of good vibes, and drawn to the sentiments of Sham 69‘s ‘When The Kids Are United’, Hillage ended up as the unlikely onstage guest of the group at the 1978 Reading Festival. Unfortunately, the event was marred by a stage invasion of National Front supporters. One of the better solo efforts from the innovative Canterbury guitarist/musician. Certainly still grounded in the early to mid '70s Gong sound, but with a sort of new-agey electronica slant. That may or may not sound appealing, but Hillage's unique style is very focused yet authentically psychedelic (a seeming contradiction perhaps).

Yeah, but we didn’t consider it a particularly big deal at the time. It was something we did for fun. I think that throwaway aspect gave us a lot of freedom and confidence. We weren’t like, “Oh God, this is our big chance,” y’know? We didn’t really give a toss. Obviously we wanted to play stuff we liked, and we did! The Snakecharmers Ball [Summer 1979 Open Demo at Crofton Cottage] [02:07] CD 22 - Sparks Volume 4: 1. Time Lines [1983 Single B-Side (Studio Pre-Mix)] [06:16]

Notes

They liked Gong, actually. My mother was always friendly with Daevid Allen and met him loads of times. She used to say, “I like that Daevid Allen, he’s a very funny man.” They came to quite a few Gong gigs and invited the band to dinner once. Lamb and mint sauce. I don’t know whether that appealed to all the vegetarians in the band [laughs]. It happened in Loughton in Essex. Strange things do happen! attire and displayed a new kind of Canterbury magic unlike anything that had ever been recorded before. The effortlessly glides forgetting those trademark Hillage guitar glissandos which soar right up into the stratosphere. This is one fish you won't want