[3] In 1969, Hillage began studies at the University of Kent in Canterbury, befriending local bands Caravan and Spirogyra and occasionally jamming with them.

Caravan put him in touch with their manager Terry King, who got Hillage signed with Deram on the basis of a demo of his material recorded with the help of Dave Stewart of Egg.

Following a series of concerts throughout 1971, several of them supporting label mates Caravan, Khan began recording their debut album in November, by which time Heninghem had left, forcing Hillage to bring in his former bandmate Dave Stewart to play the keyboard parts.

Hillage decided to form a new line-up with a slightly different direction, retaining the services of Peachey and asking Stewart back, and adding Nigel Griggs (later of Split Enz) on bass.

In January 1973, he took part in the sessions for Flying Teapot, the first installment of the "Radio Gnome" trilogy, and soon after graduated to full-time membership with the departure of bassist/lead guitarist Christian Tritsch.

The 'classic' line-up of Gong was now in place, with Daevid Allen, Gilli Smyth, Didier Malherbe, Tim Blake, Mike Howlett and Pierre Moerlen, and recorded two further albums, Angels Egg and You (the latter also featuring Giraudy).

[3] In June 1973, Hillage (along with Pierre Moerlen) participated in the debut live performance of Mike Oldfield's Tubular Bells at Queen Elizabeth Hall.

From August 1974 to February 1975 Hillage worked on his debut solo album Fish Rising at Manor Studios with the group, less Allen and Smyth, and contributions from others such former as Khan bandmate Dave Stewart.

For his first post-Gong solo work, Hillage and Giraudy relocated to Woodstock, New York in May and June 1976 to record with Todd Rundgren and his band Utopia on L, which included covers of "Hurdy Gurdy Man" and "It's All Too Much" that became integral to his live set.

In January and February 1977 they supported Electric Light Orchestra on their US tour and appeared on the German television music programme Rockpalast in March.

[7] In late summer, Hillage produced Nik Turner's Xitintoday album which featured contributions from other Gong members, Harry Williamson and drummer Andy Anderson.

During the US tour Hillage had taken an interest in funk music and became disheartened that he was being perceived as "progressive rock" and so deliberately chose to move in that direction.

The titles were derived from BASIC programming language and reflect the pair's movement into computer-based music production, this being mainly synthetic except for Hillage's guitar.

[14] Hillage also produced in the 1990s a raï musical show called '1, 2, 3 Soleils', featuring Algerian singers Faudel, Rachid Taha and Khaled.

In January 2007, four of his albums – Fish Rising, L, Motivation Radio and Rainbow Dome Musick – were released in the UK remastered on CD, each, except the latter, with previously unreleased bonus tracks.

Hillage played on a cover of Elton John's "Rocket Man" on William Shatner's 2011 release Seeking Major Tom.