The influence of "Hilly Fields" has been noted on Bevis Frond, Robyn Hitchcock, Robert Wyatt, and XTC's psychedelic alter egos the Dukes of Stratosphear, as well as the hypnagogic pop movement of the 2000s.

With collaborator Gavin Mills, the duo produced a number of house tracks in the early 1990s under the names Psychotropic, Freefall and Airtight and enjoyed some chart success.

Following years of negotiations, a compilation of Nicely's two singles and unreleased tracks recorded between 1978 and 2004, titled Psychotropia, was released in 2004.

Secret Life Of Chance (2022), Afterworld 2023 Nickolas Laurien was born in 1959 in Greenland on a stopover during a transatlantic flight by his parents,[2][3] but he grew up firstly in Hitchin in Hertfordshire, and then later went on to live in Brockley, a Victorian conservation area in south London which has left a profound mark on his musical output.

Showcasing his demo tapes to various companies, he was signed by the Heath Levy publishing group who wanted to use some of his songs for other artists.

"[3] Leach later became a sought-after session musician, playing keyboards for Barclay James Harvest, Brian May and Russell Watson among others, as well as being involved in the musical bands for the stage shows We Will Rock You and Strictly Come Dancing.

However, by the time the single was re-released, interest and airplay support had fallen and the song failed to make the UK charts.

[3] Hearing the early demo of the song, Hansa turned down the opportunity to release it, but an A&R man at EMI was more enthusiastic and signed Nicely to the label.

Despite favourable reviews in the music press, the single was not well promoted by EMI (Nicely believed that this was due in part to bad feeling between the label and his manager at the time[3]), and as a result the song had almost no distribution or airplay, and failed to make an impression on the charts.

Despite "Hilly Fields" lack of chart success, EMI were keen to release the proposed follow-up single, "On the Coast".

"Hilly Fields" had also attracted the attention of Trevor Horn, who approached Nicely with a view to producing his next songs, but Nicely turned him down, saying, "I knew that he would have creative control... also I was intimidated about going into Trevor Horn's studio and doing the singing and working with a guy who was having that sort of success.

His only appearance on record during the rest of the 1980s was contributing backing vocals to three tracks on the 1987 album A Cabinet of Curiosities by English singer-songwriter Paul Roland.

Nicely recalled his involvement in that period: "we went right through acid house, the parties, '89, the whole scene—and it was a time that I enjoyed my greatest commercial success in the top of the dance charts.

So it was definitely something that informs my work and yes, it was a fascinating period to be in the middle of that huge movement, when people really did think that the song had died and it was all going to be the emotions coming off the sound from mainly linear dance records, though a lot of them weren't of course.

[citation needed] Nicely's work has been credited with inspiring several modern-day artists, most notably XTC's psychedelic offshoot band The Dukes of Stratosphear[7] as well as the Bevis Frond, Robyn Hitchcock and Robert Wyatt.

Several nick nicely songs have appeared on various compilations: "On the Beach (The Ladder Descends)" was included on the German mix album Permanent Vacation 2 in 2007, "49 Cigars" was featured on the album A Monstrous Psychedelic Bubble Exploding in Your Mind: Volume 1 compiled by Amorphous Androgynous in 2008, and the same year "London South" was included on Terrascope Audio Entertainment – Volume 2, only available from Terrascope Online.

In 2012 Nicely was invited to play two shows by Kasper and Herlinde Raeman, at Meneer Malasch (Amsterdam) and Wastelands Festival (Ghent).

From the start of 2018 Nicely has been working on live performances accompanied by the musician Bug Lover and generating new versions of old tracks and adding visuals.