Plain and Fancy: 03/30/26

Monday, March 30, 2026

Daevid Allen - Stoned Innocent Frankenstein (1971 australia / uk, fascinating experimental guitar jam prog rock, 2014 double disc remaster)

It's strangely like hearing a wonderful new album - but one you already intimately know! Double album of unreleased alternative versions and different mixes of daevid's first solo album. We thought "it's there in the can but it needs to be out there, heard and enjoyed" - so we're releasing it all. There's nothing more, the Stoned/Banana cupboard is now bare. The design and layout, which cleverly uses daevid's original artwork as well as previously unseen drawings and artifacts of the time from the Gong archives, is by Peter Hartl with a little finishing by the ex-Invisible Clive Buckland-Bork. It is a triple-fold card sleeve with 12 page booklet. Respect is due to Brian 'Zero' Abbott who not only did a first class mastering job, but has been a patient source of information and encouragement in helping to finally realise this release.

It seems that at one point during it's gestation daevid's first solo album was to be called 'Stoned Innocent Frankenstein'. In fact on the original BYG vinyl pressings the tracks on Side 1 are headed 'Bananamoon' and those on Side 2 'Stoned Innocent Frankenstein' Somewhere along the line 'Bananamoon' became the official title, no-body seems to remember why. It's certainly a more 'cuddly' name, but I think 'Stoned Innocent Frankenstein' moniker suits the edgy, almost one-take, psychedelic/garage music of the album much more. daevid even got as far as drawing up a record label for that title and a spooky photograph of daevid's shadow in a pose similar to that of the silent film classic 'Nosferatu' was taken and used perhaps working towards a cover concept which never quite coalesced. Maybe that's when 'Bananamoon' as a title was decided upon? It was during the recording of these tracks that daevid first met a youthful Tim Blake, almost two years before he joined Gong. Tim was an engineer/tape op/keen studio helper.

The audio is a different, more clear, crisp and dynamic take than that of the classic daevid album. The tracks are akin to original pencil drawings and initial vibrant oil sketches which were eventually over-painted to create what became the full oil painting, covered in the required layers of 'varnish', to complete a final album suitable for 1970 consumption. Consequentially it makes all the other versions sound rather muddy by comparison. Illuminating and revealing would be ideal terms to describe these recordings.

Disc 1 follows the order of the original 'Bananamoon' album using alternative versions and alternative mixes, none of of which have been available before, in fact until the tape was unearthed in daevid's collection I don't think they had been heard by anyone for more than 25 years. Each track brings a new, fresh perspective.

The first disc alone would be an notable and intriguing Planet Gong archive release event, but there's disc 2 as well. The second CD will obviously directly appeal to the more seasoned Gong/daevid allen sonic co-traveller, consisting as it does of some deep tape-loopery and 3 different slices of the title track, one of the most out there, but oddly honest tracks daevid ever recorded. Actually there are enough juicy, innovative sections for anyone with an inquiring musical mind to enjoy, not just deep Gongsters and staunch Allenites.

Gong-Planet