Gonga

The unaffiliated renegade biker, Gonga don't fit and don't care. They rock, hard with sacred and profane power, yet doom is upon them. Like an ancient curse the potency of British Heavy Rock remains undiminished by time or taste.

Formed in the past - circa 1998, by Will Smalley Thomas Elgie and George Elgie we started out as Octane Bud and did not know what we was doin...! A mutual love of low-end rumble, alternative desires and a lack of knowledge drove us on to create a high volume, yet low frequency sound that was influenced by Iron Monkey, Earth, Jimi Hendrix, Melvins, The Who, Obituary, Kyuss, Burning Witch and many other earth/soul moving bands/thoughts.....Up until this point we had been instrumental but were joined by Joe Volk as part-time vocalist. We played our first show at the Shambala Festival in Somerset as Temple, and were the only heavy rock band on the bill - we went down well all things considered, then got asked to play a couple of local parties and then put on some gigs of our own in West Country watering holes. In 2003 our first record came out, with Joe now full time vocals on Invada Records, a Bristol label run by (Fat) Paul Horlick and Geoff Barrow of Portishead. In early 2004 Will unfortunately decided to leave the band after a tour with Mondo Generator and we had to decide wether to quit or continue, as Will was a founder member i did not know if i wanted to, or could replace him. As luck would have it Hugo - totally full on amazing bass wizard -of Bristol Psych-rockers The Heads was at a bit of a loose end due to their ultra slow work rate so he stepped in for a while, but just as our styles began to fuse and work on the second album was well under way Hugo had to leave to regroup with The Heads. Yet again we were faced with the task of finding a suitable replacement. So, as you can see, bass player problems have been key to holding things back a little - 7th January 2,006 Hallam Kite becomes initiated as lead bass player - GONGA mkIII begins, and we record the second album but as mixing progresses Hallam leaves to attack guitars with his mind-hand. We were stuck for a bit and had many jams with the awesome dude who is Chris West of the mighty Taint and Solomon Kane, he played at the Cooler with us at the Invada christ mass gig. Taint are a busy outfit though and alas Chris is too busy to commit fully, but there is a twist.... supercool Peter Theobalds (ex-brutal death metalers Ackercocke) came along for a jam one day and we decided he should stay, so he did and now Gonga IV are ready to punish time for passing without us.....soon brethren!!

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