I too was in London and saw Gong in some wonderful venues, including The Roundhouse and The L.S.E. One time all us freaks got off the train at Reading station, wearing stripey pyjama trousers and green PHP hats, along with the usual denim and oil of patchouli, to be glared at by loads of squaddies who wanted to go into battle with us! Heavy!
The Submarine Captain, Hi T. Moonweed, Bloomdido Bad de Grasse, Shakti Yoni (which means fuck cunt in some language, apparently) and the master, Bert Camembert. I loved that band. Last gig I saw before the split was at Watchfield Free Festival in 1974.
I went to Paris in '77 to the reunion gig, an alldayer and allnighter as it turned out, in a circus marquee which was sited permanently as a theatre. I met a Bubble (Greek) there who had brought 1 000 tabs of acid and sold the lot. I'd brought mine.
Various members and their own bands played though the day, including a good mid-afternoon set from an unknown band called The Police. I've often wondered what happened to them. Ha ha.
When Gong took the stage, there was a massive inflated moon above the stage, lazer lights all over the place, smoke cannisters held in front of fans, the whole nine metres. Like Kesey's merry Pranksters, the gig was set up for everyone, band and audience, to melt into one mass, or mess, more properly. I was standing backstage, which was not secured, tripped out, with a guy on stilts and a big key in his back, moving around like a clockwork toy. Fire-eaters sent bolts of flame above the punters. One bloke was in a silver outfit with his face painted silver with a red nose. Not a clown's nose, but his own one from which which he had rubbed off the greasepaint in his amphetamine-fueled state of ecstacy. He was great! Steve Hillage hit on a sound and he went spinning off in a big arc and disappeared into the crowd.
It was all going so well, then a mate told me that the coach was leaving. I went outside and heard that one of us, another speed freak, was missing. We had his passport. I went back in to look for him, still spaced out and found him after a while, chatting to a lovely girl and scratching his beard. 'Stay here, man! Look at it all! Stay here!' I didn't. Major fail. I bottled it as with no money and him with no passport, it seemed to me that in the morning the shit would really hit the fan.
He turned up about a week later, with stories that were so fantastic they must of been true. The gig went on all night. The management shut down all the power, but the roadies passed out candles and they carried on acoustically. By dawn, the melting feast of freaks was happening, all singing repeatedly, 'You are me and I am you.'
I was 20, old enough to be out on my own. I could still kick myself.
That was in May, I think. A few months later, we went to 'An Evening With Daevid Allen' at The roundhouse. It wasn't billed like that , of course. During the evening, Bert explained that Castro Caracous (Cornflakes) had bankrolled the gig and was to put out a live album to recover the cash. However, the bearded virgin, Branson, had served an injunction at the gig, to wit a ban on recording his contracted artist, Steve Hillage. They told him to fuck off, of course.
It turned out that the album was being held up with this bit of business, so Daevid suggested we meet up in The Wellington? in Portabello Road, near to beardy's Vernon Yard HQ. We all marched in, about thirty of us, up the stairs to the offices, whereupon the shelves were stripped of tapes and the boxes of albums were ripped open and stuffed up the billowing granddad shirts that were popular at the time. Tim Blake was dressed a a skateboarder with helmet and lame gloves, along with a skateboard, which was just starting to be a thing; the trendsetter.
It came down to Branson and some staff on one side and us on the other, arguing the toss. They got cornflakes on the blower and thrashed out a deal. Byg would release the double live album Gong Est Mort? Vive Gong, virgin would put out a collection of poor recordings and outtakes and such. I bought both. The gig album had a picture of the band with Steve cut out of it. Conversely, the virgin one, contains on the sleeves loads of thumbnail pictures from the Paris gig.
My mate went off to stash his steal in his car and came back. They were still arguing. When Tim Blake spoke, Daevid doodled on a thick brown card envelope that records could be posted in. Seemed to me that he didn't care to listen when Tim talked. As the party broke up, I asked Daevid for a look and he handed it to me. Nice one.
As we left there were staff taking back what the heads were trying to walk out with. I showed that the envelope was empty and out we went, me chatting up a beautiful young french woman whose head had been blown off by a few puffs from my spliff.
A few weeks later, an NME journo submitted an article about the event. In the picture, I could be seen among the freaks, sitting on a desk, passing a joint to another freak near to me, smiles all round.
It was long ago and far away. Been good to trawl through all this. Whoopee!
