planet gong digital

Soundcheck Preserves
Live 2K - A ten course sonic hedge-harvest

Before the doors open…

This finely-tuned and unique recipe arrives direct to your aural palate from Gong's extensively exhausting year 2000 tour of the USA, the UK, and Europe, compiled from only the very best ingredients, nourishingly nurtured and matured in deep caves over many years…

To prevent terminal sound check boredom from rearing it's head, after a line-check to verify that all channels were arriving clean at the sound desk it was suggested that the band set up and jam whenever ready. I could then work on individual channel equalisation and so forth in solo mode and fade them in when ready.

Such a strategy helped do away with relentless and tedious repetition of kick-kick-kick, snare-snare, one-two, etc. (not very musical or interesting at the best of times), and created some lovely one-off riffs and improv's, some of which managed to get recorded on DAT, CD, cassette, wax cylinders, wire, …whatever was to hand at the venue at the time.

This was also a great benefit technically, as I could hear the individual instruments as they were being coloured by other sounds around them, and not in a falsely separated environment, and also had a real chance to put the outboard effects on offer through their paces.

I also found that when I (eventually) got home we had a treasure trove of material which would normally have been lost to the ethers, and spent a few days choosing the best bits to produce this delectable and delicious chutney of sound bytes.

Most effectively enjoyed with a generous slice of moon cheese.

david id.
march, 2009

Both MP3 and FLAC versions include a JPEG image of the front cover (as above; by David Id).

Tracks: [55'11]
  1. Flute Stuff [1'59]
  2. Sahara Shuffle [8'20]
  3. Pool Side Truffle [6'22]
  4. Teddy Bears [1'38]
  5. DidgyDodgy [6'43]
  6. Bill and Ben [6'10]
  7. Key Slime Pie [3'22]
  8. Bagpipe Pixies [11'03]
  9. Temple Drum'n'Bass [7'54]
  10. Elastic Lounge Lizard [1'10]