Gong

In contrast to their European peers such as Hawkwind, Neu!, Can, and Amon Düül II, the perpetually shifting ensemble Gong attracted far less attention for its trailblazing psychedelic space rock steeped in extraterrestrial lore and alternate realities. The group also ranked among the earliest acts in that circle to fully integrate and celebrate improvisation throughout the late 1960s and 1970s. Gong exerted such lasting influence that several musicians who passed through its ranks, including Gilli Smyth, Steve Hillage, Didier Malherbe, Allan Holdsworth, and Pip Pyle, later sustained independent careers at the helm of their own projects.

Formed in France in 1967 by Australian guitarist Daevid Allen, a founding member of Soft Machine, and vocalist Gilli Smyth, the band crafted trippy music laced with humor and Dadaist passages that moved through labyrinthine grooves, intricate charts, and abundant improvisation. Its 1969 debut, Magick Brother, appeared on France’s BYG label and featured vanguard jazz bassist Barre Phillips as a guest. Widely regarded as a classic, 1971’s Camembert Electrique mapped the boundary-less frontiers of the collective’s sound. Although personnel rotated constantly across the decades, with Allen and Smyth among those who departed at times, the band repeatedly reassembled around fresh collaborators and spawned numerous offshoots while inspiring parallel outfits such as Pierre Moerlin’s Gong, Mother Gong, Planet Gong, and Gongmaison. The 1973 and 1974 releases Flying Teapot, Angel’s Egg, and You formed the conceptually linked “Radio Gnome Invisible” trilogy, each now viewed as an avant-prog classic. By 2009 the overarching concept had expanded across six albums, among them Shapeshifter (1992), Zero to Infinity (2000), and 2032 (2009). The original lineup reconvened for tours between 1996 and 2001. Allen died in 2015 and Smyth followed a year later, yet Gong persists today as a quintet.

Gong coalesced in the late 1960s after Allen, formerly of Soft Machine, began recording with his wife, singer Gilli Smyth, and a rotating cast of supporting players. Early documents from that phase include Magick Brother, Mystic Sister (1969) and the spontaneous Bananamoon (1971), which enlisted Robert Wyatt of Soft Machine, Gary Wright of Spooky Tooth, and Maggie Bell. A stable configuration comprising Frenchman Didier Malherbe on sax and reeds, Christian Tritsch on bass, Pip Pyle on drums, Allen on glissando guitar and vocals, and Smyth on space whisper vocals was formally christened Gong; it issued Camembert Electrique in late 1971, supplied the soundtrack to the film Continental Circus, and contributed music to the album Obsolete by French poet Dashiel Hedayat.

Camembert Electrique first introduced the band’s mythology of the peaceful Planet Gong, home to Radio Gnomes, Pothead Pixies, and Octave Doctors. These figures, together with Zero the Hero, anchored the next three albums—the Radio Gnome Trilogy of Flying Teapot (1973), Angel’s Egg (1974), and You (1975). Across the trilogy the protagonist Zero the Hero, a space traveler from Earth, becomes lost, discovers Planet Gong, receives instruction from the gnomes, pixies, and Octave Doctors, and returns home to disseminate knowledge of the mystical world. Band members adopted nicknames during this era: Allen was known as Bert Camembert or the Dingo Virgin, Smyth as Shakti Yoni, Malherbe as Bloomdido Bad de Grasse, Tritsch as the Submarine Captain, and Pyle as the Heap. Over the course of the trilogy Tritsch and Pyle departed, replaced by Mike Howlett on bass and Pierre Moerlen on drums, while Steve Hillage on guitar and Tim Blake on synthesizers joined the fold.

Following You, Allen, Hillage, and Smyth exited amid creative differences and exhaustion. Guitarist Allan Holdsworth came aboard and the group veered toward virtuosic yet conventional jazz fusion. Hillage and Allen each issued multiple solo albums, and Smyth launched Mothergong. Nevertheless the trilogy-era lineup reconvened for occasional one-off concerts, including a 1977 French performance captured on the album Gong Est Mort, Vive Gong. Allen also rejoined Malherbe and Pyle plus other longtime associates for 1992’s Shapeshifter, while Hillage operated under the ambient-techno alias System 7. Numerous Gong-related projects have arisen over time, among them Mothergong, Gongzilla, Pierre Moerlin’s Gong, NY Gong, Planet Gong, and Gongmaison. In the new millennium the band continued releasing material, including Live 2 Infinitea in fall 2000 and countless reissues. I Am Your Egg surfaced in 2006 via United States of Distribution. Various configurations featuring Allen and Smyth performed and recorded sporadically, culminating in the final album I See You, issued in 2014, before Allen succumbed to cancer in Australia on March 13, 2015, at age 77. Smyth died in 2016 of pulmonary pneumonia. Gong endures as a quintet comprising Fabio Golfetti on lead guitar, Dave Sturt on bass, Ian East on reed and woodwinds, Kavus Torabi on guitar and vocals, and Cheb Nettles on drums. In 2019 the group released Universe Also Collapses for K-Scope.