II

Previously unreleased follow-up to the AOR bands 1984 debut album. When it came time to begin preparations for Billy Satellite's second album, Monty Byrom and his colleagues were boosted by the news that Keith Olsen had been signed up to produce the record starting in Summer 1985 at Good Night L.A. studios. Once work had commenced things did sometimes get a little heated, as Monty and Danny Chauncey (guitar) fought with Olsen over some changes the producer wanted to make, specifically declaring that he wanted to bring in session bassist Randy Jackson to play Ira Walker's bass parts. In the end, only a keyboard player (Bill Cuomo) was brought in, but had Monty expected such a confrontation before working with Keith, or did it come as a bit of a shock? Monty recalls that the album took around four to six weeks to complete, but the band were soon on the receiving end of a bombshell that would utterly derail their progress. Having fallen out with key executives at Capitol, Carter had secured a similar post at A&M Records. He was replaced at Capitol by Jimmy Iovine. As a result, the second Billy Satellite album was quietly shelved and the band was dropped. There was never any working title for the second album and, to Monty's knowledge, none of the songs were utilized anywhere else. I didn't listen to the second album for about five years, Monty adds. But when I finally listened to it I kicked myself that it was never really finished. There are some really great songs on there! And we'd actually recorded around two other albums worth of material in our time. We were very prolific. Featuring a very interesting array of tunes, with a noticeably heavier direction in places than the first album that would've garnered rave reviews had it actually been released in 1985 or 86, Monty is really pleased that this record is finally, after 30 years, seeing official release.