Steve Hillage-'Live At Deeply Vale Fesitval 1978'(Ozit)2-CD
Mike Reed | USA | 01/11/2005
(4 out of 5 stars)
"About as good,if not better than either of his 'Live Herald' or 'BBC Radio 1' releases(see my review of both).A very satisfactory sound board-source live recording of a historic concert.This gig has apparently been bootlegged before,so this official/legit pressing is most welcome.All of disc one(9 tracks)and the first four(4)of disc two add up to the approx. 80 minute performance that with the exception of a few flaws in the last couple of songs,give the true Hillage fan a real audio gem as well as a memorable keepsake.The flaws don't really effect the quality of the show.Do what I do,think of it as one of those band/artist-released CD's where their taping equipment had some minor problems.The tunes I liked best are "Searching For The Spark","Octave Doctors","Palm Trees",the Donovan cover "Hurdy Gurdy Man",the tripping "Lunar Musick Suite" and "Glorious OM Riff".Line up is:Hillage-guitar,vocals&keyboards,Miquette Giraudy-vocals&synthesizer,Christian Boule-glissando guitar,John Mackenzie-bass&vocals and Andy Anderson-drums.Disc two continues with various audio segments that were lifted from an audience cassette recording.There's a couple of Tractor,one that's actually live from a Deeply Vale outing that I thought sounded about as good as this Hillage show did.Believe I also heard some crowd chatter here and there.Comes with two(2)eight page fold-outs with plenty of informative liner notes and good photos.A must-have for all true fans of Hillage,Gong,Canterbury,Avant Garde and just British psych in general.Aging hippies,rejoice because it rarely gets better than this.Just a great cosmic piece of work.Recommended."