A nod to Daevid Allen (who died in March) and his influence on all underground music from the early sixties to Psychedelia and onwards. A founder member of Soft Machine and lifelong itinerant experimentalist, one looks on with awe at his and the band’s ability to be so completely lost in the music whilst breezing through the song’s complicated arrangement with ease. Written by unsung guitar hero Steve Hillage, the song comes from the Angel’s Egg album released in 1973 (The second album in the Radio Gnome Trilogy). More on the long complex history of Gong, the offshoots, the anarchist hippie French commune and the cosmic Daevid Allen in the future – I hope!

One might say he was too mad to write anything normal about, too serious to treat like he was mad, too unfocused to get a grasp of, too eclectic to nail down, too precisely deeply committed to his vision to ignore, too complex to explain in a few words, too simple, too clever. It might take years to write anything meaningful and worthy about him…or a few seconds would suffice. His output alone would take years to analyse but here is as  good a place as any to start. I saw him live once in a small venue in Glastonbury…perfect!

This from Wikipedia on the line -up for the album:

Note: Pseudonyms and absurd instrument names selected by Daevid Allen are used on the album credits; real names are used in composer credits, and are shown in brackets.

Bloomdido Bad De Grass (Didier Malherbe) – ten/sop sax, floot, bi-focal vocal
Shakti Yoni (Gilli Smyth) – space whisper, loin cackle
T. Being esq. (Mike Howlett, spelled Howlitt on composer credits) – basso profundo
Sub. Capt. Hillage (Steve Hillage) – lewd guitar
Hi T. Moonweed (the favourite) (Tim Blake) – Cynthia “size a”, lady voce
Pierre de Strasbourg (Pierre Moerlen, spelled Moerlin on composer credits) – bread & batteur drums, vibes, marimba
Mirielle de Strasbourg (Mireille Bauer) – glockenspiel
Dingo Virgin (Daevid Allen) – local vocals, aluminium croon, glissando guitar

Each member has along musical history that would take days to compile – I could fill the whole page with links, so research at your desire.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gong_(band)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daevid_Allen

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Hillage