Steve Hackett "Please Don't Touch!"

Please Don't Touch! is the second solo album by English guitarist Steve Hackett, and his first after leaving Genesis in 1977.

The album featured several guests including R&B singer Randy Crawford on "Hoping Love Will Last", American folk icon Richie Havens on two songs, the drummer and vocalist for the progressive rock band Kansas (Phil Ehart and Steve Walsh respectively), Frank Zappa alumnus Tom Fowler, Genesis concert drummer Chester Thompson (also a Zappa alumnus), and Van der Graaf Generator violinist Graham Smith.

This was also Hackett's first album to feature his pioneering use of the Roland GR-500 Guitar Synthesizer.

In 2005, Please Don't Touch! was remastered and re-released by Hackett's Camino Records label. The new edition features updated liner notes and three bonus tracks. A new 5.1 surround mix of the album by Steven Wilson is included in Premonitions: The Charisma Recordings 1975-1983 [10-CD/4-DVD Boxed Set] (2015).

Please Don't Touch! was the first solo album that Hackett released after leaving Genesis during the mixing of the 1977 live album Seconds Out.


Hackett had previously released a solo album, Voyage of the Acolyte, while still a member of Genesis, but he was frustrated by the collaborative process of Genesis which left much of his creative work unreleased. He insisted that more of his material be included on their next album. Of the four songs he brought to the writing sessions, only one, "Blood on the Rooftops", was worked on and included on their next album. He wrote a song, "Please Don't Touch", that Genesis rehearsed but ended up setting aside, partly because the other members of the band did not want to use it. He also wrote a second song, "Hoping Love Will Last", that he felt was appropriate only for a female singer, which was something that the band could not use. A third song, "Inside and Out", was left off the album, but found its way to the EP Spot the Pigeon alongside two other songs written by other members that were also left off the album. Eventually, the track "Wot Gorilla?" was decided on as the last track on the first side of Wind and Wuthering, and this decision sealed Hackett's decision to leave Genesis. Hackett quit Genesis and began to record the album Please Don't Touch, using the rejected Genesis song as the title track.

The cover was designed by the artist Kim Poor, as were many of Hackett's album covers. It shows a Victorian couple being attacked by automata in a toy shop. This became the inspiration for a scene in Blade Runner, where the character Rick Deckard (played by Harrison Ford) is attacked in a flat full of replicant toys.