Motivation Radio
Space rock turned funky and electronic in Los Angeles, with the synthesizer pioneer Malcolm Cecil at the desk: the record Hillage calls his turning point.
Steve Hillage, 1977
- Released
- September 1977
- Recorded
- July 1977
- Studio
- Record Plant, TONTO studio and Westlake Audio, Los Angeles
- Label
- Virgin
- Producer
- Malcolm Cecil
- Length
- 38:29
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Hillage wanted a funk record, citing Funkadelic, Parliament and Hendrix, and he went to Los Angeles to make it with Malcolm Cecil of Tonto's Expanding Head Band, who played his room-sized TONTO synthesizer and, Hillage said, treated the mixing desk like a huge synthesizer. Reggie McBride played bass and Joe Blocker drums. Hillage said he refused to make the record that was expected of him, and later that it set him on a new trajectory and made him more his own man.
It reached twenty-eight in Britain and did better in Europe than L had. Billboard named Radio, Motivation, Searching for the Spark and Saucer Surfing as the best tracks, and Classic Rock later called it arguably his finest. Malcolm Dome heard in it what Hillage would do a decade later with System 7.
Track listing
- Hello Dawn2:48
- Motivation4:07
- Light in the Sky4:12
- Radio6:13
- Wait One Moment3:25
- Saucer Surfing4:28
- Searching for the Spark5:38
- Octave Doctors3:38
- Not Fade Away (Glid Forever)4:00
Personnel
- Steve Hillage guitar, guitar synthesizer, voice
- Miquette Giraudy synthesizer, voice, lyrics
- Reggie McBride bass
- Joe Blocker drums
- Malcolm Cecil TONTO synthesizer, producer, engineer
More from Steve Hillage
Fish Rising (1975), L (1976), Green (1978), Rainbow Dome Musick (1979)
Sources
- Motivation Radio, Wikipedia
- Motivation Radio (Virgin, 1977), Discogs
- Steve Hillage: Searching for the Spark, an interview, Goldmine (2016-10-21)