In mid-1996 Stuart was playing with The Aliens of Extraordinary Ability. On a night off he went, with Richie Onori down to a
small club in Studio City called Cafe Cordial, to see Robbie Wykoff, the singer from the Aliens, play in his cover band.
Producer Pat Regan happened to be there that night with Won Seo, who was at that time the representative for the Korean
electronics giant, Samsung who had formed an entertainment division. Samsung had signed a production deal with Pat Regan's
company New Century Media for six artists. At the time they had five artists and were looking for the sixth. Richie Onori knew
Pat Regan from a band they'd played together in called Satyr way back in the late 70's and introduced him to Stuart. Pat was a
big fan of Keith Emerson and Stuart had admired Pat's production work on Ritchie Blackmore's "Stranger in Us All" album and
the live sound of Deep Purple's "Come Hell or High Water". The two hit it off and Stuart invited Pat and Won down to the next
Aliens show.
Remembers Stuart;
"Pat and Won came down to see us play a show at the Guitar Center in Hollywood which went really well. After the show,
which was a clinic for Alesis, the reps had hired a limo and invited us to dinner at the Rainbow Bar & Grill. I invited Pat & Won
to join us which they did and after dinner asked if the Aliens wanted to be the sixth artist for Samsung. We told them we
couldn't accept as we hadn't had a chance to write any original material as of yet".
Pat and Won came to the next show at Martini's in Hollywood where the Aliens performed their usual set plus one original song
called "The Eyes Of Man". The offer was repeated but Keith had already committed to an ELP reunion tour opening up for
Jethro Tull. About a week later Stuart was at the Baked Potato which on Tuesday nights is a regular hang out for musicains as
ex Guns & Roses keyboard player Teddy Andreas plays with his band, The Screaming Cocktail Hour and often invites
musicians he knows to get up and jam.
Teddy was one of the six artists signed to Samsung and had just completed his solo album so Won Seo was in the audience
that night with some of the top brass at Samsung to see him. Halfway through the night Teddy invited Stuart to get up and play
with the band and afterwards Won introduced Stuart to the main people at Samsung. When the place closed, Stuart invited
them to his house for an after hours drink where they asked to hear some of his own material. By the end of the night Samsung
offered Stuart a six figure deal for a solo album. "Finally, after all these years I was estatic at the prospect of being able to do
my own album", says Stuart, "and I thought the deal would be signed quickly and we'd get on with it but how wrong you can
be. First Samsung wanted to use another producer as Pat had produced three of their acts already and it took them about three
weeks to get around to telling me that. I felt as Pat had introduced me to them in the first place and had been instrumental in
getting the deal to go through, he should rightly produce it, plus I liked his ideas on what to do with my music. I've always been
a loyal person and felt this wasn't right so at this point I took one of the biggest risks of my life. I called Won the next day and
said if I couldn't do the album with Pat the deal was off. The next couple of weeks were probably the longest of my life. Won
had to relay my reply to Samsung in Korea and they had to make a decision and get back to me. It took about two weeks but
they finally called back and agreed but then they wanted half my publishing to which I said no. Again more time went by while
the messages were relayed back and forth and eventually they gave in and gave me what I wanted, basically I think because
they realized how stubborn I was going to be. After waiting this long to do a solo album I'd decided not to give in to anyone".
On September, 30th 1996, three months after they'd offered him the deal, Stuart signed with Samsung.
