Release date: 1979
Label: Arista
Production: Pierre Moerlen
Length: 43:39
Genre: jazz rock fusion/progressive rock
Rating: 7.5/10
On “Time Is The Key,” the jazz rock fusion incarnation of cult band Gong, led by French drum master Pierre Moerlen, started making heavy use of ‘mallet’ sticks when working percussion into its sound, while the sounds of vibraphone, glockenspiel, gongs and timpani began to take over. That approach became a Moerlen’s Gong trademark pretty much until the very end. This time around, the A-list guests included guitar grandmaster Allan Holdsworth (ex-Nucleus, Soft Machine, Gong, U.K., Bruford), jazz keyboardist Peter Lemer and violinist Darryl Way (ex-Curved Air, Darryl Way’s Wolf), who contributed violin to the opener “Ard Na Greine.”
The first two tracks, “Ard Na Greine” and “Earthrise,” also reveal some prog rock influences, but otherwise this is arrangement-wise very friendly, easygoing, percussion-driven jazz fusion that’s a real treat for ambient music fans too. “Supermarket,” with its minimalist, ‘tiny toddler shoes’ percussion sound and all-over ‘Hawaii’ vibe, recalls something that later, in the eighties, inspired the musical backdrop of the early Nintendo video games starring Super Mario. The ambient lullaby “Faerie Steps,” with its fragile vibraphone sounds, and “An American in England” keep up the album’s prevailing still-life mood. Things only get a bit livelier on “Organ Grinder,” where guitarist Bon Lozaga in particular comes alive and serves up some wonderfully colorful guitar passages. The short “Sugar Street,” with its emphasis on synth arrangements and nostalgic pulse, could pass for an instrumental cut by the legendary The Alan Parsons Project.
The playful “The Bender” features the high notes of Lemer’s polymoog and some seriously dynamic work from the Moerlen/Hansford Rowe rhythm section, while Lozaga dishes out tasty guitar phrases. “Arabesque,” spiced up with an oriental vibe, is built on pentatonic scales, making it jazz fusion to the taste of the late Yasser Arafat, while the distinctly prog-leaning “Esnuria Two” is a somewhat weaker follow-up to the “Esnuria” classic from “Gazeuse!” (1976). The title track is a textbook example of commercially flavored jazz fusion with cheerful arrangements and shameless new wave touches, all at the cost of a total synth victory. The last three tracks are saved from mediocrity mostly by Holdsworth’s guitar artistry, which is once again a chapter of its own.
“Time Is The Key” was a thoroughly decent album that cemented Moerlen’s approach to melodic, ambient-rich jazz fusion with the odd prog rock element, but there was (no longer) much to say about any great innovation, since the basic recipe, built on all sorts of percussion, stayed more or less the same. The main problem with Moerlen’s Gong was that, despite the occasional interesting idea, their music started losing its freshness with every new release, and the increasingly synthetic-sounding synth parts that came to dominate in the eighties didn’t do it any favors.
by: Peter Podbrežnik
track list:
1. Ard Na Greine
2. Earthrise
3. Supermarket
4. Faerie Steps
5. An American in England
6. The Organ Grinder
7. Sugar Street
8. The Bender
9. Arabesque Intro & Arabesque
10. Esnuria Two
11. Time is the Key
Pierre Moerlen’s Gong:
Pierre Moerlen – drums, percussion, synthesizer
Hansford Rowe – bass guitar, acoustic guitar, bass synthesizer
Bon Lozaga – guitar
guest musicians:
Darryl Way – violin (1)
Allan Holdsworth – guitar (9-11)
Joe Kirby – acoustic bass (1,2)
Peter Lemer – keyboards (3-11)
Nico Ramsden – guitar (8)
