STEVE HACKETT • Shadow Of The Hierophant/Clocks - The Angel Of Mons [Live at Musikladen1978]

Originally broadcast in the German TV early in 1979, this small-sized gig captures the ex-GENESIS guitarist at the very early stage of his live solo performing career. Despite that fact, there are material from three different albums; Spectral Mornings hadn’t yet come out at the time. To many these first three albums are the best ones too. So the track list is really fine! One could almost say, too fine for this sextet. I’m referring to the songs that originally featured guest vocalists (Steve Walsh of KANSAS, Sally Oldfield, Phil Collins) and are now sung by Pete Hicks. He manages to sound quite a lot like Walsh on ’Racing in A’ and ’Narnia’, but his high, falsetto-approaching vocal performance on ’Shadow of Hierophant’ is a rather disturbing mockery of Sally Oldfield’s soprano excellence. That’s about the only fault I can find in this set. The playing is energetic, highlighting Hackett’s versatile guitar technics. Brother John’s flute graces several tracks, and Nick Magnus is great on keyboards. Mellotron on ’Hierophant’, wow! The camera work and sonic quality are both fairly good. There are two previously unreleased bonuses from the same gig: ’Carry On Up the Vicarage’ (I wonder how Hackett makes himself sound like a little squirrel), and ’Star of Sirius’, in which the vocal parts sound a bit blurry. Despite some tiny minuses, this is a totally recommendable release for all Hackett fans.