Hawkwind - 1974 - Hall of the Mountain Grill

(7xCD + 2xBlu-ray Box Set, Esoteric Recordings [2025 Edition] ) 

When a band has been prolific as Hawkwind, still touring and releasing albums more than 50 years on from their inception, it is likely there will always be some debate among fans about what is the best studio release. When it comes to the ‘Wind then my personal view will probably always be ‘Quark, Strangeness and Charm’, just because that was the first album of theirs I heard, not long after it was released in 1977, but there is no doubt that 1974’s ‘Hall of the Mountain Grill’ is viewed by many as the classic album to have, and now Esoteric have gone full throttle with this newly released nine-disc limited edition boxed set which contains the original album newly remastered from the original master tapes, along with new mixes from the original 16-track master tapes by Stephen W. Tayler of previously unreleased full concerts at Edmonton, January 1974 and the 1999 Party at Cleveland in March 1974 plus a new mix of the 1999 party in Chicago. It also includes 2 region free Blu-ray discs of 5.1 up-mix of Hall Of The Mountain Grill and a 5.1 mix of Hawkwind Live In Cleveland May 1974 (which I don’t have) plus a further seven bonus tracks drawn from rare singles and studio out-takes. This means that for the seven CDs we have a total of 69 songs with 6 ½ hours of playing time.

Now, I have a rule in that I never write about anything until I have listened to everything on an album (some reviewers just play parts of tracks, or only a few tracks on an album to get an overview), so this was quite a time investment on my part, but I loved every single second of it. Robert Calvert and Dik Mik had departed by then (although Robert does appear at one of the concerts) and Simon House had joined on violin and keyboards, taking the band in a new direction. Having been influenced by the success of ‘Ummagumma’, Hawkwind decided on a similar approach with this one so the original album is a combination of studio recordings and over-dubbed live recordings, and while the original album is a joy to listen to there is no doubt that many Hawkwind fans will be salivating at the release of “new” concerts from a period when the band were arguably at their very best.

With one concert from January 1974 plus two from consecutive nights in March the same year there is a lot of duplication of songs, but when the band is as on form as this then that is never an issue at all. The work undertaken by Stephen W. Tayler is exemplary, and I must confess I have always thought of Lemmy as primarily playing his bass as rhythm guitar but here he is clearly providing wonderful countermelodies to Brock which works very well indeed. “Brainbox Pollution”, “Brainstorm”, “Sonic Attack”, “Master of the Universe”, “Orgone Accumulator”, “Silver Machine” and many other classic songs are all here alongside live cuts from the album such as “The Psychedelic Warlords (Disappear in Smoke)”, “Paradox” and “D-Rider”, showing a band very much in their prime. There is an extensive book containing a very detailed and informative essay from Robert Godwin plus loads of photos and clippings, and the overall result is something which is absolutely essential to any serious fan of the band. 

Kev Rowland, October 2025

Links:
https://www.esotericrecordings.com/
https://www.hawkwind.com/