Gong
Magick Brother, Mystic Sister

In the village, an unbelievable buzz was growing, an authentic sound carpet, an indecipherable chatter that seemed to truly come from another galaxy.

It all started from that teapot, landed in the Allens’ garden with the furtive delicacy of a butterfly.

Mirage or reality?

Some swore they saw it landing at 5 in the evening, others claimed to see only a metallic spout protruding from the branches of the silver pine, but it was probably a buzzard's beak.

So, did this flying teapot exist?

And then what would have happened if it was discovered that in the Allen house they also kept a dragon in the garage?

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In that Parisian May of '68, Daevid Allen and his muse Gilli Smyth, residing on a houseboat on the rive gauche were hearts on the run and in the storm, wandering and vagabond spirits, too light for any trivially earthly gravity; a childish curiosity, a subtle and sometimes even cruel sarcasm.

An exceptional talent for finding, everywhere, even in the most remote caves of Deia, disoriented but functional artists for that interstellar project named Planet Gong, which would see its genesis with the release of Magick Brother Mystic Sister, published by BYG Records, a label specialized in free jazz releases which Allen cleverly seduced until the final release, Magick Brother being primarily an ensemble of adorable psychedelic tablettes.

“Soyez réaliste, demandez l’impossible“ was whispered in those Parisian suburbs, among those playful and violent outbursts, with that photogenic but inexorable wind.

In doubt whether to take the elevator or the power, Jean Luc was novelizing like crazy and Daevid and Gilli suddenly turned flying cobblestones into plush teddy bears, with everyone's blessing.

And those were really tough times for those who tried to confiscate democracy; you ended up showered by a rain of stones or, at best, magically turned into a ceramic swagman teapot.

I came to know this fantastic band many years ago, fascinated and by chance, as often happens, by the title of their first official album even though initially it was produced in very few copies and credited only to Allen.

Since time immemorial love is one of the most universal feelings, in its overbearing madness.

And if the love between a brother and a sister, away from prying eyes, might reveal itself as just a "whisker" unnatural to some, what could be said of an intimate and transversal liaison between a magic brother and a mystic sister?

And in that sweet confusion, in that bubble suspended between escape and insurrection, listening to Magick Brother,in that cauldron of psychedelia takes on an ironically essential tone but even more enticingly murky after spending a fauve night in the company of your favorite Exterminating Angel, perhaps strolling with Daevid Allen and Hugh Hopper through the streets of Paris.

Because then, to feel good anywhere, in the end, it's important to lose them forever, those coordinates, and not give the enemy any points of reference.

And on that same wave, with that lo-fi impertinence that will distinguish it from the subsequent works of the trilogy, the Magick Brother is Pop in its flesh and Barrettesque in spirit but without dissonances and outlines, here everything is a relished affront to Pop architectures, formats, metrics, some pleasing jazzy clouds towards the stable and Allen's London past, those blurred London forays in the company of friends at the Marquee.

If then that desire for eastern transcendence, inherent in the Gong project, couldn't have a natural vent on human frequencies, it seems legitimate to tune in before takeoff to the waves of the most cosmic poetess available in the schedule and leave her space whispers all the infinite at disposal to give space to her boundless ability to relate to other worlds, contexts, and dimensions, in fact, no coding faculty is allowed in that harrowing Blow Up of Princess Dreaming.

With that guitar struck by a series of long metal rods and with Gilli whispering distant alien plots, the '60s comfort zone and metrics are a distant mirage and the brink of the abyss is just at the door, with all those odd time segmentations, arrhythmias, and a matter of heritage from the free jazz tradition and the improvisations of Desmond and Brubeck...

And so all that’s left is to trip over those Icarus plots and free oneself in that flight with Gilli, in that intensive expansion territory, letting oneself be led by the hand by those molecules hidden among the trees, capable of weaving unpredictable routes and tucked between our proverbial synapses. Because as uncle Daevid said, the key to everything is recognizing imagination's transversal cognitive capacity and circulating it, tout court…

When handling heavy material, when nurturing dragon cubs with love in the garage, even the natural course of time may be whimsical and it may happen that Chainstone Chant: Pretty Miss Titty in its wild intro sounds irreverent like a snicker from Johnny Rotten, only to airily unfold thereafter into a dark and pastoral ballad à la Thin White Rope.

A strange inner calm, rich in oriental references, pervades Allen's acoustic guitar in Rational Anthem, after all, the desert calm evoked by this song is the lowest point from which to observe the devolvement of a species; from that sonic maelstrom from the depths of Death Valley we are always at that question mark, whether to take the power or the elevator…

But what is psychedelia if it isn't also a bit pop, or rather what is Pop if it isn't also psychedelic, because it's only a moment to send that desert tea stasis to cavalry and fall under the fanfares of Gong Song and its underlying free jazz text that finds in that limping dance a perfect and cumbersome fit.

Because extreme complexity hides a primordial simplicity, and it might really seem unusual from an intro traveling in a dream of Amon Düül II to see the power pop exuberance of Big Star gush from those shadows, but it's one thing what can happen with your feet on the ground and another entirely what you hear aboard a flying teapot.