Their twentieth album. Not bad !
Well, the label says Gong. But this is really a coop between Whatever-Gong-is-now and Acid Mother Temple. That band is a mad Japanese band who release three albums a year with spaced out space avant-garde jams and tours the world with ditto type of madness. My reviews of three of their albums leaves nothing to be desired. This album has a great degree of the same madness.
In Daevid Allen, they have found a true brother in arms. That except from his version of Gong being pretty structured while the Japanese madmen is not.
So we get fifty minutes with Daevid Allen and Gilli Smith's vocals over some pretty banal songs. We also get some good jazz and space rock here. Then we get Acid Mother Temple at full flow. For example at a song called Makototen which is fourteen minutes with Acid Mother Temple at full flow. In particular Kawabata Makoto's very feedback driven guitars.
Actually, this may sound a bit negative. I am not a fan of Acid Mother Temple. But Daevid Allen has harnessed them to good used under the Gong name on this album. Add his and Gong's own contributions and the result is a very good album which sits well under the Gong name. It is very much in the spirit of Gong.
Yes, I find myself really liking this album a lot. So much that it is up there with the better Gong albums. Check it out.
3.5 points
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