2007 Re-issue
In 2007 the album was re-issued on CD by Sony BMG with a second disc comprising a complete live album, Live at the Proms 1970, which had been previously released by a small independent company called Reckless Records in 1988. This album was recorded at The BBC Proms in Royal Albert Hall in Westminster, London, for BBC Radio Three on 13 August 1970. The band's performance, opening for the BBC Symphony Orchestra, marked the first time that a popular-music band played at the classical festival. The disparity of the Soft Machine's concert as compared to the hall's usual fare is explained by Robert Wyatt on the Reckless album's liner notes:
We was invited by Tom Souster, who had an evening using the hall to do what he liked with. I believe he'd heard our second LP, asked us on the strength of that. He discovered us on the way to discovering Motown. Via the Who, I think. Anyway it was brave of him to invite us despite the withering contempt of the posh music establishment. Before our bit, I went out the back for a quick fag and then the doorman didn't want to let me back in. "I've got to play in there", I said. "You must be kidding, son", he said, "they only have proper music in there". Not that night they didn't.
- Robert Wyatt, album liner notes
Both discs were re-mastered for the re-issue, improving the sound quality significantly.
Read more about this topic: Third (Soft Machine Album)