King Crimson: Classic Or Dud

41 minutes, but only 5 full tracks.

Yeah it's pretty odd, there's so much material to choose from, I would think a definitive document of those shows would have to be at least 2 hrs long.

This disc is "One More Red Nightmare" (never performed live!!), "ConstruKction of Light" (but just the instrumental part - sounds an awful lot like something off SaBB this way), "The Letters" (!), "Sailor's Tale" (!!), and "Starless" (!!!) It's pretty good really, my only complaint is that the "three drummer frontline" is not very audible. If I didn't know better I would think there was just one!

That's a bit disappointing about the mixing- but maybe you really need to see all three to track how each is playing.

I'm sure there will be a DVD or something, but I've never gotten much out of live videos (vs live records)

King Crimson live albums since 2000 or so tend not to have a lot of post-mixing, and I think this one is like that too. Very "official bootleg" kind of approach. I'm not sure a video would really add much to the experience. The drummer frontline was fun and all, but without Belew the band is seriously lacking in stage presence (Venal Leader hid off in the corner and was completely invisible to much of the audience for the whole of the show).

Me I'm kind of waiting for them to start selling unedited recordings of all the shows online (which they tend to do) and then just pick up the show I was at.

xp - I think the mixing is alright, it's just that the drum parts mayne don't really call for three separate players? I dunno, those who had seen the show could comment, you probably can hear all three just fine, it's just nothing like what I would expect out of such a lineup

Reiflin played a lot less than you'd expect and spent a lot of time covering the mellotron parts.

Fripp isn't diarizing anymore, but David Singleton is picking up a little bit of the slack. His most recent entry has this:

As a mastering engineer it is fascinating to read the various thoughts on the sound of the Orpheum - particularly as it shows how many people listen to music with their hifi’s already in strange settings. There is, of course, no right answer. Music can be delicate and music can hit you over the head. When compiling BBOOM, RF asked why bootlegs were often more exciting than proper releases. And the answer is absurd amounts of compression. Hence the brickwall limiting on that album, which deliberately mimicked a bootleg (and which conveniently cures some of the defects of the live mixing). The same approach has been used on most of the board recordings in the various 1970s boxed sets. The Orpheum takes the alternative approach. There is also the question of what, in a live context, is a "good mix" - Brian May used to say that the secret to an exciting live recording is that something should be too loud ie. that a well-mixed live show is not the same as a studio recording. Again, the Orpheum, rightly in my opinion, takes the alternative approach. Vive la difference.

thanks for that!

13 concerts announced: 9 UK, 2 Paris, 2 Utrecht

Meant to add link: http://www.dgmlive.com/news.htm?entry=5036

RF missed an opportunity to fuck with everybody and change the lineup again

he doesn't move that fast. It would take him another 15 years to make that decision.

too true. I doubt they'll so much as alter the setlist.

Never seen this. From the "Beat" tour, so there is a bunch of stuff they don't usually do live.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=64swVmq_XPk

Someone was just recommending that concert to me last week as a potential entry point to the Belew-era band. I really hate Belew, though.

10 Canadian shows in November: http://www.dgmlive.com/news.htm?entry=5138

Wonder if a second American tour is in the offing.

god i hope so

Pat says no

16-disc THRAK box coming...

will buy

more interested in this news further down tbh:

The band will be playing more classic repertoire, some of it for the first time in the UK, from In The Court Of The Crimson King, In The Wake Of Poseidon, Islands, Larks’ Tongues In Aspic, Starless And Bible Black and Red

super stoked for these shows now

I got into Yes like a year ago for the first time ever, and now I am getting pulled big time into KC. I hope I can find another record of theirs I like as much as Red....holy SHIT!

Go immediately backwards from Red - Starless and Bible Black, Larks' Tongues in Aspic - and I also recommend the Great Deceiver, USA, and The Nightwatch live albums.

I came to them through In The Wake Of Poseidon, which is an unlikely intro considering many consider it to be a re-write of In The Court Of The Crimson King. I was only about 18 at the time and I'd never really heard of prog rock before, but to me it sounded like everything I liked about the Beatles but amplified. It's still a fave.

I'm deliberately holding off on Belew-era because I find him annoying as s-hit, although a lot of people seem to prefer "New Wave" King Crimson

Go immediately backwards from Red - Starless and Bible Black, Larks' Tongues in Aspic - and I also recommend the Great Deceiver, USA, and The Nightwatch live albums.

― the top man in the language department (誤訳侮辱), Friday, August 7, 2015 9:16 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I meant to say thank you, top man!

The Belew/new wave stuff is great but a totally different beast. I haven't really explored enough of it. Foudn some of the 90s stuff very changeable. I think I heard a bit of Thrak once and was surprised at how AOR some of it sounded.

I got into Yes like a year ago for the first time ever, and now I am getting pulled big time into KC. I hope I can find another record of theirs I like as much as Red....holy SHIT!

― Iago Galdston, Friday, August 7, 2015 1:15 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Red certainly sets the bar. But all of the above recommendations are otm. I'm one of those who thinks KC's best albums (Red, LTIA, ITCOTCK, and Discipline) are peaks of human achievement, though.

Don't fear the Belew era - those three records are GREAT. Try the instrumentals first if Belew scares you ff (I'm assuming you mean his singing). Also, a good gateway into this stuff is the live 2xCD Absent Lovers, which cherry picks the best stuff and features some outstanding performances. Ditto the Neal and Jack and Me DVD.

I began to understand Belew more when I read that when he first started playing guitar, he didn't know what effects pedals were, so he just assumed every sound he heard a guitar player make was somehow done with the player's hands, and so he tried to do that. Listening through that lens turned me from an appreciator to a big fan.

That said, I will concede the vocals on "Elephant Talk" never fail to grate, even after 100 listens.

Oh, and my love for Yes hinges on the fact that the only albums I know well are Close To The Edge, Fragile, and Chris Squire's solo album. If that was Yes' entire discography, they'd be one of my all time favorite bands. Most everything else I've heard has either been just ok (Drama, 90215, Relayer) or unlistenable (Topographic Oceans, Tormato, etc etc etc).

Do you like VDGG? If you feel a prog kick coming on, I'd listen to those records before any Yes (or Genesis, or Tull, or...). Incredible, mind-shattering music.

Iago, I consider Larks' Tongues to be neck and neck with Red as kc's best. Forced against the wall I might choose larks. Maybe.

I began to understand Belew more when I read that when he first started playing guitar, he didn't know what effects pedals were, so he just assumed every sound he heard a guitar player make was somehow done with the player's hands, and so he tried to do that.

There's a great story of him trying out for Bowie's band, and him trying to replicate all the guitars in "Heroes" by himself. Bowie and Eno were apparently cracking up in the control room.

Belew-fearful, start with this:

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

Or maybe:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pWyJfdob0a4&list=PLSxRK4Dk6d971J9IFjFB7kHM0FhnqjXP6

Or even this version, which is nuts to watch:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZ758xfIK4I

I read some interview with Belew where he said he used to try out alternate tunings in just single strings just to keep things interesting. Like tuning his B string to a C or something.

Or maybe it's EADG#BE?

Iago, I consider Larks' Tongues to be neck and neck with Red as kc's best. Forced against the wall I might choose larks. Maybe.

― Corn on the macabre (Jon not Jon), Friday, August 7, 2015 4:29 PM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

^^^ this, right down to the "maybe" part. Like the Velvet Underground's first four LPs, whichever of these two I am listening to at the time is my favorite.

Have considered a Larks' Tongues tattoo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRch-u3QcxY

Somehow I missed out on the Complete Lark's Recordings Box

Oh, and my love for Yes hinges on the fact that the only albums I know well are Close To The Edge, Fragile, and Chris Squire's solo album. If that was Yes' entire discography, they'd be one of my all time favorite bands. Most everything else I've heard has either been just ok (Drama, 90215, Relayer) or unlistenable (Topographic Oceans, Tormato, etc etc etc).

Do you like VDGG? If you feel a prog kick coming on, I'd listen to those records before any Yes (or Genesis, or Tull, or...). Incredible, mind-shattering music.

― Wimmels, Friday, August 7, 2015 11:52 AM (Yesterday) Bookmark

Thanks, Wimmels and everyone else, for the responses. Wimmels, you don't like The Yes Album? I'm getting into Larks now...KC is going to be a major obsession with me, I can tell already.

Although I must say the first line of Great Deceiver is not so funny!

Hate that line

palmer-james hasn't aged well, whereas Sinfeld's hippy phantasies seem removed from time altogether

King Crimson offer a particularly good argument for ignoring lyrics.

it takes discipline

Wimmels, you don't like The Yes Album?

iirc I liked it fine. But, hits aside, I just never got very familiar with it, and nothing about it made me want to. A lot of it just seemed like a warmup for the awesomeness to come later that year. Truth be told, though, I should go back to it. I might like it more now. iirc it was the first album with Steve Howe, right?

It's funny, I'm always bracing myself for the "other", reputely lesser Yes albums being kinda crap but I always end up being really impressed by them (still lots of 80s-90s albums to get).

I wouldn't say "lots"...

Not really looking forward to the Thrak set ... some good moments to be sure, but I feel like there was altogether too much digital FX mucking about during that era. Thought on their latest American tour that they dialed it back considerably, which may have been aided by Collins' presence.

"It's funny, I'm always bracing myself for the "other", reputely lesser Yes albums being kinda crap but I always end up being really impressed by them (still lots of 80s-90s albums to get)."

well you will be disappointed by those. I don't think any albums they did after 90125 were across the board good until Fly From Here. There are some individual tracks here and there and entire albums that should be deleted from the universe.

Sorry I overlooked answering your question about VDGG, Wimmels. I have never heard a note of them!

VDGG are amazing but early solo Peter Hammmill is just as important if not more.

7 Yes albums is kind of a lot to me.

looks like Crim will be selling a ghastly looking picture disc 12" EP for this slate of shows. No word content.