Rejoice! I'm Dead! Gong

• 1 The Thing That Should Be 03:34
• 2 Rejoice! 10:16
• 3 Kaptial 03:23
• 4 Model Village 06:43
• 5 Beatrix 02:54
• 6 Visions 04:29
• 7 The Unspeakable Stands Revealed 11:56
• 8 Through Restless Seas I Come 06:57
• 9 Insert Yr Own Prophecy 09:38
• Total Runtime 59:50

Info for Rejoice! I'm Dead!

“Inspired by the light, love and passing of our dear friend and inspiration Daevid Allen.” (Dave Sturt)

Gong entered yet another new phase on their four-decades-plus journey with Rejoice! I’m Dead!, their 2016 studio album. It was the follow up to 2014’s I See You, the last album Daevid Allen was to record with Gong.

Some say it couldn’t, or shouldn’t, be done. How could Gong exist without Daevid Allen? A few minutes into listening to Rejoice! and aspersions will be cast aside. New members and old coalesce. It is undeniably Gong.

Rejoice! I’m Dead! is classified as the band’s 28th album and the Gong legacy is the strongest it has been since 1974. Every member was key in the development of each new song - Kavus Torabi (vocals/guitar), also of Knifeworld, who joined Gong in 2014 in time for the last album unaware of the direction his new gig as a guitar player would take, Fabio Golfetti (guitar/vocals), Dave Sturt (bass/vocals), Ian East (sax/flute) and Cheb Nettles (drums/vocals) took on the mantle of steering the Teapot further into outer space and the inner ear. The voice of Daevid Allen features on 2 songs - “Model Village” and “Beatrix”, and the album also features guests - Steve Hillage playing a guitar solo on “Rejoice!” and Didier Malherbe’s duduk can be heard on “Model Village” and “Through Restless Seas I Come”.

Rejoice! I'm Dead! was recorded in London in the Spring of 2016 at Brixton Hill Studios, engineered by Nick Howiantz and Gong; mixed by Mark Cawthra (Infallible Ear) and Dave Sturt (Swimming Head).

"It is Gong, like they have been forever: "spacey, psychedelic, jazzy, humorous, absurd" (8/10 Eclipsed)

"the Gong legacy gets a blast of adrenaline" (All About Jazz)

Daevid Allen, vocals (track 5)
Kavus Torabi (Cardiacs, Knifeworld), vocals, guitar
Fabio Golfetti, guitar, vocals
Ian East, soprano, sopranino, baritone & tenor saxes, flute, whistles, bells, shaker
Dave Sturt (Jade Warrior), bass, acoustic bass (5), EBow bass (5,6,9), keyboards (4,8), percussion (4), vocals (1,2,4,7)
Cheb Nettles, drums, percussion (track 8), vocals (tracks 1,2,7,9)
Additional musicians:
Graham Clark, violin (track 1)
Steve Hillage, guitar solo (track 2)
Didier Malherbe, duduk (tracks 4,8)
Chris Ellis, piano (track 5)

Gong
The ever metamorphosing entity that is Gong launches, as ever, into unknown – and unknowing – territory with a new album and tour, destined to be talked about, discussed, and argued over, up and down the land.

From its beginnings in a French commune in 1967, through the Virgin Records years, mismanagement, court cases, break-ups and rejoinings, deaths and rebirths – there has always been a continuous thread of beautiful, dangerous and extraordinary music.

The current holders of the flame have come together over the last seven years; sinuous bass player Dave Sturt joined just as the album 2032 was shown to the world; Ian ‘Eastwinds’ East was the next to blow in through the portal; Fabio Golfetti brought his guitars from Brazil (after working with Daevid for many years); Kavus Torabi appeared to Daevid in a vision; Cheb Nettles just sort of turned up.

Gong’s musically diverse world includes shades of psychedelia, space rock, jazz, avant-garde, krautrock and surreal soundscapes.

Signed-up members of the precariat, Gong have never played it safe.

GONG : the legendary psychedelic space rock collective formed in 1969

Australian beatnik poet Daevid Allen (ex-Soft Machine) began making music with his partner Gilli Smyth in the late 1960s, along with a constantly evolving community of creative musicians. Albums from this period include Magick Brother, Mystic Sister (1969) and the influential Bananamoon (1971) – one of David Bowie’s favourite 20 albums.

A stable line-up of the band, now named Gong, eventually materialised featuring Didier Malherbe (sax and reeds), Christian Tritsch (bass), and Pip Pyle (drums), along with Allen (glissando guitar, vocals) and Smyth (space whisper, vocals). This band released the album Camembert Electrique in late 1971, as well as providing the soundtrack to the iconic biker film Continental Circus and music for the album Obsolete by French poet Dashiel Hedayat.

Gong’s next three albums, released on Virgin Records, became known as the known as the Radio Gnome Trilogy, consisting of Flying Teapot (1973), Angel’s Egg (1974), and You (1975). Over the course of the Trilogy, Tritsch and Pyle left and were replaced by Mike Howlett (bass) and Pierre Moerlen (drums). New members Steve Hillage (guitar) and Tim Blake (synthesizers) also joined.

After You, Allen, Hillage, Blake and Smyth left the group, guitarist Allan Holdsworth joined, and the band moved into a virtuosic jazz fusion style. Nevertheless the trilogy lineup reunited for a few one-off concerts including a 1977 French concert, documented on the Gong Est Mort, Vive Gong album. Allen also reunited with Malherbe and Pyle for 1992’s Shapeshifter album and the Gong 25th Birthday Party in 1994.

A great gathering of the Gong family took place in Amsterdam at the Unconvention in 2006 featuring many previous members and related bands. This event reinvigorated the band, leading to the release of the album 2032 in 2009 and the subsequent tour saw the arrival of Dave Sturt (bass) and Ian East (saxophone).

In 2012, Daevid Allen also enlisted Fabio Golfetti (guitar) and Orlando Allen (drums) for a tour of Europe, UK, Japan and Brazil. By 2013 Kavus Torabi (guitar) had also joined the group and the line-up of Allen, Sturt, East, Golfetti, Allen and Torabi then recorded the album I See You (2014). That year, Daevid Allen was diagnosed with cancer and was unable to perform whilst undergoing treatment. Fulfilling his wishes, the band continued the Gong tradition without him and toured to promote the album, bringing in Cheb Nettles (drums).

In 2015, Daevid Allen passed away. His influence and legacy were honoured on the band’s subsequent album, Rejoice! I’m Dead! (2016).

The band have continued to tour internationally since that time including visits to China, Scandinavia, Brasil, Japan and Canada. They recorded their new album The Universe Also Collapses, scheduled for release on Kscope music in May 2019.

This album contains no booklet.