Dec
13
Review: Gong – Camembert Electrique (1971)
Filed Under Reviews
For those who know French or even have a basic knowledge of cheese, I know what you are thinking. How can an album titled “electric cheese” be anything but laughably bad?Well this just is. This light-hearted release comes from Gong, one of the many bands that came from Canterbury, England in the late sixties and early seventies (other bands include Soft Machine, Arzachel, and Egg). Unlike, the hordes of San Franciscan psychedelic sound-a-likes these groups from Britain experimented with numerous genres, especially jazz. Camembert Electrique was one of Gong’s earlier releases and precedes the Radio Gnome Invisible Trilogy, a musical trilogy with such an absurd confusing plot that I could not describe at my present sober state. Though the music itself is remarkable. With the start of the introductory track, which is a creepy distorted voice speaking in a language that I cannot comprehend (French I believe), you know you are in for a truly unique experience. The first song on the album, “You Can’t Kill Me” pulls you out of the horrified ball that you have just recently curled into after imagining the violent French gnomes from the thirty-second introduction, with it’s infectious groove and the sonic exhibition from Daevid Allen (guitar, vocals) and Didier Malherbe (saxophone) who are respected credited on the record as Bert Camembert and Bloomdido Bad De Grasse. At this point if you 
have not come to the conclusion that these people were on drugs, you must be quite naive. Nevertheless, what follows is a set of medleys that finish up the remainder of the first side of the record. These medleys move in many musical directions at once, towards minimalism, towards the progressive sounds of King Crimson, and towards jazz as well. Pip Pyle, the drummer, who has a strong performance through out the entire album really gets to shines in the middle of the third medley “Dynamite/I Am Your Animal”. After another bizarre introduction the second side starts off with my favorite track of this album, “Fohat Digs Holes in Space”. ”Fohat Digs Holes in Space” starts off quite spacey, reminiscent of Syd Barrett era Pink Floyd and krautrock groups like Cluster and Ash Ra Tempel then breaking into catchy interlude, finally finishing in a jazzy outro that Frank Zappa could be proud of. After the near conventional psychedelic track, “Tried So Hard” comes the final song and medley “Tropical Fish/Selene”. Along with “Fohat” this last song is an absolute gem that exemplifies Gong’s earlier work as both silly yet extremely experimental and creative nature, which is something that I quite enjoy.
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