Gazeuse

Gong

album cover

A Prog-Rock Gas

Choppy, hiccuping grooves? Check. Endlessly long solos from a flamboyant guitarist? Check. Vaguely exotic sounds? Check. Yup, it's jazz-rock fusion all right. Yet somehow Gong's finely-tuned Gazeuse! neatly sidesteps the clichés associated with the form. It's a totally engrossing journey, one of the few fashion records that's plenty verbose yet doesn't get tangled up in its own discourse.

Gong began, in the early '70s, as an exceptionally versatile band intent on exploring new amalgamations of jazz and rock. Camembert Electrique (1971), masterminded by the Australian guitarist, vocalist, and mythmaker Daevid Allen, told of life on Planet Gong, and introduced a cast of whispering gnomes and Pothead Pixies who hung around for three similarly spacey subsequent albums. Then came a huge shake-up. Allen and others left, and the band ditched the interstellar conceits to emphasize muscular, hard-driving, super-intense instrumental music.

Virtuoso drummer Pierre Moerlen, the band's new leader, put together a frontline consisting of two mallet players, on vibraphone and marimba—they sometimes play together, but often their lines overlap and interlock, connecting ancient (the wood of marimba) with modern (the metallic ping of the vibraphone), tribal ritual with subway ride. Into that lattice-work steps Allan Holdsworth, a demonically inventive guitar soloist whose approach changes depending on the atmosphere. He lunges and snarls like a heavy-metal god, and then, when the rhythm's more funky, plays a twisted melody that sounds like the aural representation of a calculus equation.

When Holdsworth's playing, this band sounds like it's on a purposeful quest. A notoriously technical musician, he may have a ton to say, but doesn't feel compelled to say it all at once. He moves over these percolating soundscapes with the patience of a great storyteller, and as you follow his thoughts on the swervy "Night Illusion" and the booty-shaking "Ensnuria," you can't help wondering how fusion ever got such a bad name. This bubbly stuff sure doesn't deserve it.

Genre: Rock
Released: 1976, Virgin
Key Tracks: "Night Illusion," "Percolations."
Catalog Choice: Allan Holdsworth: Metal Fatigue.
Next Stop: Brand X: Missing Period
After That: Jean-Luc Ponty: King Kong.
Book Page: 316