Psychedelic rock band formed by Daevid Allen and Gilli Smyth in France in 1969. Gong became pioneers of a new brand of psychedelia/space-rock/trip-rock - with a conceptual ethos involving aliens and alternative realities. An international outfit, increasingly linked to other bands of the Canterbury scene, many musicians came and went. Without Daevid the band continued with Steve Hillage as leader for a short while, and then in various incarnations as the more jazz-rock styled Pierre Moerlen's Gong. There have been many other versions of Gong over the years, and many reformations since 1990.