King Crimson: Classic Or Dud

I've heard great things about RED, but I've never heard it. Possibly due to the stigma of John Wetton. Even though RED predated Asia by veritable eons, I cannot erase the crime.

Red is ace, and has been discussed here before. The instrumental tracks are the ones that sound less dated - especially the title track and its 'devils interval' backstory.

But I think Wettons vocals on Starless and Red are lovely and I disagree that the placid quietness of them is just 'static' - there is a line on one of the tracks on Starless... 'My Home... was a place by the sea' which I just adore and I've never known why - but it kept popping up in my head when I had my Steve Erickson reading binge a couple of years ago and it has that same mesmeric Erickson quality of difference and strangeness but not different and not strange (ooh thats a hopeless description: Somebody save me here!).

There are three formulas involved in the Larks/Starless/Red tracks - and I think I like them all.

There are the dream-like songs I've already mentioned - all playful repeating echos of other things, and that strange wailing sound which I always imagine is one of them corrugated tubes you wave around your head - but presumably is just frippertronics (it turns up on evening star too). I always thought they were an influence on Nirvana on Nevermind's quiet moments but haven't seen it confirmed that Cobain knew this stuff.

Then there are the agressive ones - Red, the loud bits in Larks part one - the bit in Fracture where it suddenly changes speed. For a prog band they sure conjure with an magikal energy - that stuff sounds great - its a shame that neither the post rockers like Mogwai / Aeorgramme / etc or the Nu Metallers studied that stuff to avoid making their mistakes. Its not just a feature of that period of Crimson though, 21st C on the first album, the bit nicked from Mars on the second have that feel too.

The bits that are left form a third grouping, mainly instrumental and much more passive - but definately not static. The quiet bits of Larks pt1, Trio, Night Watch. Larks overtly references Vaughn Williams and thats a good suggestion of what's going on, Debussy and Satie too. But there is a lack of optimism in those tracks that doesn't sit well with the grace of those influences. They are bleak and hopeless feeling too.

"Easy Money" has this (on the live versions, not the studio version, alas) great (for prog rock, mind you) bit of lyric:

"So I argued with the judge, But the bastard wouldn't budge, 'cause they caught me licking fudge, and they never told me once, you were a minor..."

Mark- Apparently Red is KC's favourite album ever. He also loved the raincoats, having written some brief notes for the reissue of their excellent debut. Even though nirvana sucked he had good taste (though I think that he only said that to piss off the metal fans that bought his music).

Agnes Moorehead, obviously. :)

Ladies of the Road and Formetera Ladies are the clunkers I refered to above btw. Though I think Sinfields worst lyrics are on Still.

Truly unfathomable, I wouldn't have believed it had I not seen it with my own eyes. However, it explains much. There's a site where I help write reviews for prog rock albums, and we once received a snippy letter for dissing the Wake of Poseidon album (or at least, not being fanboy-ish enough towards it), and the person, opening up by claiming we had "less wit and culture than an ant" (yep) used much of the material found in the Wake of Poseidon chapter as their defense of the album and its depth. Maybe it was even The Keeper of the onyx-embolden'd-husking-jewelled-warthogs website himself! :)

Cue your golf swing.

Wow... Mind = blown.

Very cool! thx ned

"that's some really wild stuff"

In The Lounge of the Crimson King

More on Belew's fourth-rate David Byrne impersonation - "I repeat myself under stress, I repeat myself under stress." Geddit? Hilarious, eh? Anybody who finds that remotely amusing in any way should be avoided.

Dave Q really killed it on this thread, huh? I like lots of KC but I hardly ever find myself playing them. When I do, it's either Larks' Tongues or Beat.

I think Belew's a pretty terrible lyricist but that was kinda the point, right? The lyrics weren't supposed to stand out. It was all about the music at that point.

Met this guy tonight who said he'd done tarot card readings with Adrian Belew, back in '83 or so

the story just got weirder from there

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ILSVAUjd5QI&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Fripp speaks

excellent...wish it was longer

2009 Crimson, with Porcupine Tree drummer as second drummer, was awesome live.

so, who is buying the 13 CD, 1 DVD, 1 Blu-Ray of Larks' Tongue In Aspic?

http://www.dgmlive.com/news.htm?entry=3916

Just registered for DJM live site just so I could hear a sparse guide track for "Islands" the song. Boz sounds like he's singing into a cheap condenser mike, but otherwise it's quite lovely.

'Islands' is the worst album ever made by anybody.
― dave q, Friday, February 15, 2002 7:00 PM (10 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

NO.

its kind of weird to imagine that King Crimson only played a fixed amount of concerts when they were active. it feels like they're able to just create more and more live bootleg material at will, even if it was phyiscally impossible for them to have played that many dates.

So many of them are pretty dodgy quality though, aren't they?

http://static.rateyourmusic.com/lk/l/w/dd360157ea8e506661983ea7336800bc/4330188.gif

classic:

'released in three separate editions to satisfy the merely curious and the expectant collector'

so, who is buying the 13 CD, 1 DVD, 1 Blu-Ray of /Larks' Tongue In Aspic/?

http://www.dgmlive.com/news.htm?entry=3916

I used to feel exactly the same way but then it all just clicked for me and I found Belew bearable all of a sudden - I think it helped if I thought of him in more of an 80s nerdy / comedic tradition, like computer programmer jokes in text adventure games or Douglas Adams or Steve Gerber.

And then having categorised his annoyingness as a particular era-specific flavour/texture I could kind of mentally file him away and concentrate on the music which is frequently incredible.

I unapologetically like him on some songs too where he isn’t so goofy - like, Frame By Frame is just great full stop.

I'm a big fan of that era of the band, Discipline in particular. I get where you're coming from, but Belew's persona never bothered me. In fact, it works very much to the advantage of something like "Thela Hun Ginjeet", where I can 100% relate to this inoffensive guy inadvertently finding himself in a dangerous situation. ("I'm still shaking!") Also, his singing and playing is so effortlessly on point in the gorgeous "Matte Kudasai".

Discipline is easily the best of those three albums, but I think there's a live album from the voluminous catalogue that's supposed to be the best way of hearing that lineup. Not sure which one. Belew's vocals are hard to take, yes. However I'd rather listen to him than Boz Burrell or Gordon Haskell. As ever, prog vocals remain a thing to endure rather than love (with a few honourable exceptions, none of them KC-related).

"Absent Lovers" is the live album you're looking for.

I was a teen when I first heard "Three Of A Perfect Pair" and fell for it immediately. Maybe it's because I was already hanging out with nerds who thought puns were clever but I'm a big fan of everything Adrian was involved with until the mid-90s when his charm sort of wore off. But the three 80s Crimson albums are all gold.

I love "Three" and "Discipline," listen to "Beat" a lot less but still like it. Don't mind Belew the singer, who is basically like Byrne if he wished he was in the Beatles, and yet, still could play like Belew. Regardless, it barely needs to be said but the "Beat" tour a year or two ago absolutely ripped, one of the best things I've seen, and despite the different line-up and some slight deviations was pretty faithful to the studio versions of those three albums.

Me, I can't really get into the '90s/"Thrak" and beyond era of the band.

Absent Lovers is incredible, I agree on that!

I could have written your whole original post word for word. The phrase “shut up ‘n’ play yer guitar” may have been coined by Zappa but it was made for Belew.

there's a sort of neurosis present amongst all King Crimson's singers, it's part of what gives them a mystical quality, Belew I think tries to imitate that in his own way but it's not particularly convincing. that said most of his lyrics are fine, good even, plus he's a top notch guitar player who can actually keep up with Fripp, his voice is excellent, he's also the only one in the group actually writing songs, I don't think it could've worked without him. BEAT (the band) I think proves the point, you can swap out Fripp and Bruford (obviously Vai and Carey are no slouches) and it still sounds great, but the recent KC's lineup attempt to do some 80s material didn't quite come off right.

I should probably revisit those 90s/00s albums - THRAK did kind of drag but Belew's songs were always very good (especially "Dinosaur" and "Walking on Air")...TCoL I liked much less, though I am intrigued by the remix which apparently does away with a lot of that ugly thwack on the drums. TPTB I thought was solid. but kind of a strange final album since it felt like they were still going somewhere.

When you tangle it in with all the more or less concurrent ProjeKCts maybe it makes more sense. I've never spent much time with those, though I did see one line-up live that featured Belew exclusively on drums! Belew, Fripp and Gunn, maybe?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V0WC1C_kHBw

those were the first albums by KC I ever heard and I remain very fond of all three of them.

Discipline is prob my 4th fave after the Larks'/Starless/Red run

"The Sheltering Sky" remains a towering achievement, also perfect for Belew haters

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T879-kGjRcY

yes I too saw a 10+ minute "Sheltering Sky" and it got a standing ovation, one of the coolest concert experiences of my life honestly

It's what sealed the deal for Vai for me, his expressiveness really added a lot to the performance. Plus his zoot suit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-BCHKT_250

She wasn't the one, Syd.

London beat gig tonight.

looking forward to it, but first time seeing a band in Hammersmith Apollo, not expecting great things from venue, hopefully musicians and vibe can overcome.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YuJkx3xQUJ4

That's the same venue referenced by Motörhead for No Sleep 'til Hammersmith so think of it that way. Enjoy!

CLASSIC: The first three LPs and 'Starless and Bible Black', as well as, a tier or so down, the other Wetton/Bruford era albums, which are super, but not as great as the same material live (Or as Magma or Henry Cow). DUD? I don't know, as I don't acknowledge the existence of Crimson post-RED! But few albums were as important to teenage 1970s me as 'Lizard' and 'Starless' (and I still thank my often problematic late father for chaperoning me to see the 'Starless & Bible Black' lineup live in 1974, on the very same day that Schoolkids Records in Tampa FL got the album in stock!)

Fripp attended that Beat show last night, someone who was sitting behind him posted a very short video on Reddit of the back of his head.

was he sitting perfectly still and erect (in every sense)?

kind of!

https://www.reddit.com/r/KingCrimson/comments/1tzpbgy/back_of_robert_fripps_head_at_beat/

On a big King Crimson tip right now. I finally bought a copy of Red, which is probably my favourite KC album but I never owned a proper copy. I also just ordered S&BB off Discogs to complete my mid-period colleciton along with Lark's Tongues.

I also realised I'd never actually listened to Islands before - mostly because it has tepid reviews - but you know what, it's really quite good!

This all sent me reeling back to the late-90s when I was first getting into the band. I remember getting a CD out the library called "A Young Person's Guide To King Crimson" with a distinct hand-drawn picture on the front. Mysteriously, looking it up on Wikipedia, it seems the only CD version of this compilation was released in Japan, is very hard to come by, and has a different tracklisting to the CD I had. My version seemed to be a 2-CD comp with a tracklisting similar to the first two CDs of the Frame By Frame compilation - including One More Red Nightmare and an edit of the Bolero section of Lizard. I can't find any evidence of this comp existing anywhere on the internet. Strange!

Quite interesting to dip into the infamous Earthbound live album from the early era. It's poorly recorded, but provides an interesting angle on how KC might have sounded in their early days: Heavy extended rock jams for the most part - quite different to anything else they ever did

Also enjoying the Night Watch live album from which a fair few cuts were taken for Starless & Bible Black. Was never too interested in live KC recordings, but some of it is very welcome!

"I Talk to the Wind" on the Young Person's compilation was, I believe, the first release of anything from the Judy Dyble phase of Giles, Giles and Fripp.

Earthbound is basically Fripp held hostage by a jam band.

there's an archival recording called Ladies of the Road which I think is a bunch better snapshot of the 1972 band...it also contains a second disc full of stitched together Schizoid Man jams

Huh, that's got an interesting version of Get Thy Bearings on it

My desert island KCs are Night Watch, Absent Lovers, and Red.

Night Watch is great, as is the 4CD Great Deceiver live box of 73-74 recordings. Epitaph (live from 69) is pretty sonically rough in parts, but the band tears it up. Earthbound... I never heard the original version, but the expanded/remastered 40th anniversary CD/DVD version is pretty good. I can see why Acid Mothers Temple ripped off its cover art.

Earthbound is obv sub-VU boot sound quality but god I love it

How many other KG records have scatting?

"Formentera Lady", I guess?

Well, yeah

Beat pulled out Heroes with, allegedly, no rehearsal

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-i76EEYi3E

Interesting, KC was encoring with that on their last tour or so.

Beat tour coming back to America with Terry Bozzio in place of Danny Carey. Intriguing!

Belew , Vai and Bozzio — would love to hear a little Zappa in the encore. Tempting to go to one of these shows — I think there’s one in Nashville?

I finally get a chance to see them

I bet this would be great.

I was lucky enough to see two shows the last time around and had a blast, so bought a couple of tickets for this one, too. Kinda getting into dangerous territories for my tastes, though. If you had told me I would pay for a project with both Vai and Bozzio I might have snorted, not because I don't think they're talented (duh, they're mutants) but because I often find their brand of virtuosity kinda tacky and distracting. But they are both utter one-off originals, and Vai acquitted himself incredibly in Beat, so now I am curious what Bozzio will bring the stage (beyond a 50 piece kit). Helps to have Belew, whose own virtuosity I find less flashy, and Levin, such a good team player/anchor. I never listened to them, but he and Bozzio recorded a couple of albums with Steve Stevens, of all people. I assume they are silly. Didn't know about this project, though:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5V1TE6yv3lU

With three of the four players Zappa alumni, I personally really hope they don't play any Zappa. Keep it Fripp focused. In this vid they say a few songs will be dropped and they will add a few quartet versions of the '90s double-trio material.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8v9d2-FfG2g

I need to familiarize myself with the 90s material more, which I remember as strong. I’ve played the 80s stuff to death.

I liked Thrak, I remember buying it when it came out. Not heard any of the other 90s albums. Best one to start with?

The double trio was iirc just "Thrak" (surprisingly, the *only* '90s KC studio album) and the preceding EP, plus a few live documents, the highlight being the improvised cacophony of "THRaKaTTaK." The subsequent stuff, the next two studio albums, I could never get into. Maybe because they lack Levin? Trey Gunn is not my favorite King Crimson member/adjunct.

I'm interested in hearing the new remixed version of ConstruKction of Light. I thought the original was pretty bad but there's a live album called Heavy ConstruKction where they do most of it and it sounds a lot better there. Maybe just having normal sounding drums will help a lot. The Power to Believe I thought was pretty good. Curious what 90s songs they're gonna do. There's not exactly a lot to pick from. I'm guessing "Sex Sleep Eat Drink Dream" will be one of them, hoping for "Dinosaur" too.

I would guess Dinosaur for sure, def. something with Belew singing. Maybe "One Time".

the remixed ConstruKction album is an improvement

The two post-Thrak albums are def arguably the least essential KC records, but they have some great tracks on them. Unfortunately they also have things like "ProzaKC Blues" "The World's My Oyster Soup Kitchen Floor Wax Museum" and "Happy with What You Have to Be Happy With", where Belew just gets to be too much.