L (Steve Hillage album)

Untitled

L is the second studio album by British progressive rock musician Steve Hillage. It was recorded primarily in New York, at the Secret Sound, Woodstock, N.Y., and was produced and engineered by Todd Rundgren, using musicians from Todd Rundgren's band Utopia and others.

The album entered the UK charts on 16 October 1976, where it stayed for 12 weeks, hitting a peak of number 10. This was the most sucessful of Steve Hillage's solo career albums, the next most successful being Motivation Radio and Green, which reached numbers 28 and 30 respectively.

The sound of the album reflects Todd Rundgren's influence quite strongly. Hillage's first album (Fish Rising, 1975) was created using the Gong band without Daevid Allen, and therefore sounded very much like a guitar oriented Gong, this album was created using Rundgren's own band, Utopia, and their influence therefore comes through very clearly. According to liner notes supplied with the US pressing, Rundgren had only just become aware of Hillage, and following a letter from Hillage to Rundgren, and a reply from Rundgren, Hillage travelled to New York to meet, and the agreement to work together flowed from that. In terms of his own sound, it wasn't until Hillage's third album, Motivation Radio, that he had created his own band around him, and therefore could continue to develop his own sound independently of others.

The cover features a clean shaven Hillage (most of the publicity shots of Hillage during the 1970's show him with a full beard) holding his guitar, brightly backlit.

Unusually for Hillage, half the songs on this album are covers. Hurdy Gurdy Man was written by Donovan P. Leitch, Om Nama Shivaya was written by Kesar Singh Nariula and Uma Nanda, and It's All Too Much was written by George Harrison, and appeared originally on the album Yellow Submarine in 1969 by the Beatles. Subsequent solo albums would feature compositions almost entirely by Hillage and long time partner and musical collaborator, Miquette Giraudy.

The original Virgin catalogue number for this album on vinyl was V2066. An American pressing was issued on Atlantic records, catalogue number SD 18205.

Track listing

Side One -
Hurdy Gurdy Man (6:32)
Hurdy Gurdy Glissando (8:54)
Electrick Gypsies (6:24)

Side Two -
Om Nama Shivaya (3:33)
Lunar Musick Suite (11:59)
It's All Too Much (6:26)

Categories: 1975 albums | Steve Hillage albums