Aktivator

A highly skilled guitarist known for his fluid, effects-heavy playing, British musician Steve Hillage has collaborated with countless musicians and influenced several genres over the course of his lengthy career, particularly space rock, prog, ambient, and techno. Initially associated with the Canterbury Scene during the late '60s and early '70s, Hillage played in groups such as Uriel and Khan before becoming a key member of psychedelic cult favorites Gong during the '70s. He launched his solo career with the ambitious 1975 prog rock suite Fish Rising.

Some gigs are simply meant to be out there - even if they take decades to actually make it into our hands. This is without doubt one of those concerts; recorded at the Philips Halle, Düsselsdorf on the 28th March 1979 during the Live Herald Tour. Released following the AIM-nominated deluxe box set from Hillage, 'Searching for the Spark', this new Düsselsdorf vinyl showcases the Steve Hillage Band's prowess with excellent sound quality - a quality so high that you'll forget that it's a live recording until the applause. This is a band at the height of it's powers, with Steve in great voice throughout, and most obviously utterly enjoying themselves. The vibe is completely infectious and doesn't let up throughout the entire gig. Featuring Steve's own adventurous compositions and covers of Beatles and Donovan classics, all are approached with a joie-de-vivre and high sensibility. The trademark heady combination of vibrant psychedelic rock interwoven with an irresistible full-blooded groove, interspersed with the smoothest of deep-space synth/guitar trips gathers all before it in a tsunami of up-lifting music. With the benefit of hindsight, Steve's musical trajectory from the creative space riffs of Gong to the trance and techno of System 7 is made instantly clear.

On Friday 21st June 1979, the Steve Hillage Band performed a headline set of soaring psychedelic guitar riffs of cosmic aspirations. The summer solstice night was a pivotal point in Steve Hillage's musical journey, and this recording, provided from Steve's personal archives, will cement the performance as historic. Prior to the festival, Steve and the band spent two weeks rehearsing in a barn at Worthy Farm, site of the Glastonbury Festival. They crafted a set fitting and psychedelically uplifting enough to truly celebrate the longest day of Summer at such an auspicious location. Steve was an integral member of the Glasto team alongside Michael Eavis, 'Pyramid' Bill Harkin and Turbosound/Funktion One's Tony Andrews. Their work focalised the 1979 Fayre, helping the rebirth of the first of the modern Glastonbury Festivals. After spending the 80's in music production, Steve and his partner Miquette Giraudy returned to recording and live performance in the 90's with the dance oriented System 7 and was fundamental in the introduction of the Dance Stage to Glastonbury in 1995.

A highly skilled guitarist known for his fluid, effects-heavy playing, British musician Steve Hillage has collaborated with countless musicians and influenced several genres over the course of his lengthy career, particularly space rock, prog, ambient, and techno. Initially associated with the Canterbury Scene during the late '60s and early '70s, Hillage played in groups such as Uriel and Khan before becoming a key member of psychedelic cult favorites Gong during the '70s.
1979 was an incredibly busy year for Steve Hillage - possibly too busy, what with three albums hitting the market in a brief span of time. Live Herald was a strong summation of his live performances, and Rainbow Dome Musick was a left turn into ambient music which, a decade later, would inspire Hillage and his constant partner Miquette Giraudy to get into the EDM scene as the ambient house act System 7…