Daevid Allen (Gong) passed away

Daevid Allen, the influential poet, musician and iconoclast best known for co-founding avant-rock bands the Soft Machine and Gong, has died, according to an announcement on his Facebook page. Allen, 77, died after complications from cancer.

The artist, who cut a wide swath through 1960s and ‘70s Europe traveling in post-Beat era circles and produced volumes of music, was responsible for so much curiously inventive work that his travels read like a history of late 20th century European musical avant-garde.

Allen helped discover a then-16-year-old British singer Robert Wyatt, collaborated or befriended artists including fellow Soft Machine mates Kevin Ayers and Mike Ratledge, minimalist composer Terry Riley, jazz trumpeter Don Cherry as well as writers William Burroughs and Robert Graves. Allen’s longtime collaborator and partner Gilli Smyth played the voice behind the curtain in the Jane Fonda sci-fi classic “Barbarella,” and Allen helped collaborate on the score.

Allen, though, is best known for the Soft Machine and Gong. The former, formed in 1966 by Allen, Wyatt, Ayers and Ratledge, was the artist’s musical springboard, and he worked on their post-British Invasion singles in 1966-67. But after visa problems prevented him from reentering England, the Australian-born artist settled in Paris, where he founded Gong. It was a whole different brand of music.

Source: LA Times