The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band was a musical group from the 1960s founded by a group of British art-school students. Their music features elements of music hall, trad jazz, and psychedelic pop with surreal humour and avant-garde art. They came to be know by the public after an appearance on a 1968 comedy show called "Do Not Adjust Your Set." Members of the band initially consisted of members Rosendale Road, West Dulwich, Rodney Slater, and Vivian Stanshall - later expanding as more members were added and dropped over the years due to interpersonal drama within the band.

Their first album, "Gorilla" was released under Liberty Records in 1967. It was produced by Gerry Bron and consisted of mostly jazz tracks. Many of the tracks on the albums parody the band's early "trad" jazz songs by playing inept jazz playing - some of the band members swapped instruments to "increase the degree of incomptence." The album was recorded in a single take under two hours. In spite of the parody-aspect of the album, Gorilla displayed the versatility of the band and the wide variety of styles they were able to play including 1920s style music, lounge music, and calypso among others. The sleeve reads that the album was "Dedicated to Kong who must have been a great bloke."

The album cover is possibly an early use of the "Cinema" typeface, or perhaps inspired later cinema-style typefaces. The typeface, Epic, was used as early as 1968. The typeface often utilizes perspective shadow, as seen in the Gorilla album cover. The album cover features several members of the band in the foreground, with someone in a gorilla costume blown up in the background.