The band initially played in a more conventional acoustic pop style, but after he joined Stereolab as a keyboardist, he was inspired to revamp the group's music closer to the electronic and orchestral sound he preferred.

Their second album, Gideon Gaye (1994), anticipated the mid 1990s easy-listening revivalist movement, and its follow-up Hawaii (1996) nearly led to a collaboration with the Beach Boys.

To support himself, O'Hagan briefly worked as a rock music journalist, and in 1990, released a solo album titled High Llamas.

Club writer Noel Murray remarked that without the Beach Boys' 1968 album Friends, "the High Llamas probably wouldn't exist.

"[9] His first record appearance was on the EP Space Age Bachelor Pad Music (1993),[10] and he remained a full-time member of the band until Mars Audiac Quintet (1994).

[4] In a 1997 article, O'Hagan spoke of the Beach Boys' 1966 album Pet Sounds as "the beginning of the great pop experiment, [before] rock and roll got hold of the whole thing and stopped it," and intended his new band to carry on in a similar tradition.

[4] British music journalists praised Gideon Gaye, but AllMusic critic Richie Unterberger stated that the album was released "almost as an afterthought [in the US], with virtually no fanfare.

Even on their most overtly Pet Sounds-influenced album, 1994's Gideon Gaye, other influences, such as Brazilian bossa nova and European film soundtracks, are obvious.

[16] The band were soon tagged as part of the nascent "ork-pop" movement, described in a 1996 Billboard piece as "a new breed of popsmiths going back to such inspirations as Brian Wilson, Burt Bacharach, and Phil Spector in the quest for building the perfect orchestrated pop masterpiece.

[22] It incorporated more electronic sounds than Gideon Gaye,[22] while its lyrics loosely address themes of "nomadism, nostalgia, film and musical theatre, and the effects of colonialism".

[25] It was accompanied by Lollo Rosso (1998), an album consisting of seven remixed Cold and Bouncy tracks created by Mouse on Mars, Cornelius, Schneider TM, Jim O'Rourke, Kid Loco, Stock, Hausen & Walkman, and the High Llamas.

Additionally, it included rarities that had been released as B-sides or bonus tracks on Japanese and American editions of their albums, while one song, "Vampo Brazil", was a previously unreleased outtake from the Cold and Bouncy sessions.

"[17] In The Rough Guide to Rock (2003), music critic Nig Hodgkins commented that despite "adventurous breakthroughs by previously obscure American bands such as Mercury Rev and the Flaming Lips," the High Llamas failed to attract a comparative following and were seen as "a little too esoteric and experimental to threaten a mainstream that had once warmed to the strong melodies of Gideon Gaye.

[35][36] In 2014, the High Llamas premiered a theatrical play, Here Come the Rattling Trees, at the Tristan Bates Theatre in London's Covent Garden.

Pitchfork critic Robert Ham summarized the plot as "extended anecdotes [used] to comment on the rapid changes happening in London, particularly in Peckham, a region in the southeastern part of the city where O'Hagan has lived for over 20 years."

During an interview to promote the record, he commented that the High Llamas were not defunct and that he was attempting to secure the rights to the band's work from Universal Music Group, "who are extremely reluctant to do anything with our catalog, and I’ve really been wanting to get them remastered and pressed on vinyl, and maybe do an expanded series like Stereolab have done.