Everything about King Crimson totally explained
King Crimson are a musical group founded by guitarist
Robert Fripp and drummer
Michael Giles in 1969. They have typically been categorised as
progressive rock, although they incorporate diverse influences ranging from
jazz,
classical and
experimental music to
psychedelic,
New Wave,
hard rock,
gamelan and
folk music. King Crimson have garnered little
radio or
music video airplay, but gained a large
cult following. Their debut album,
In the Court of the Crimson King, is widely regarded as a landmark in progressive rock. Their later excursions into even more unconventional territory have been influential on many contemporary musical artists.
In the late-1960s, the band were influential in popularising a previously unexplored
mellotron rock style. Throughout the early-1970s, King Crimson's membership fluctuated as the band explored elements of jazz and funk. The band developed an
improvisational sound influenced by hard rock and became a more stable unit in the mid-1970s, before their initial break up in 1974. The band re-formed in 1981 for three years, influenced by
new wave and
gamelan music, before breaking up again for around a decade. Following their 1994 reunion, King Crimson blended aspects of their 1980s and 1970s sound, which has continued into the 21st century.
King Crimson's membership has fluctuated considerably throughout their existence, with eighteen musicians and two lyricists passing through the ranks as full band members. Robert Fripp, the only constant member of King Crimson, has arranged several disparate line-ups of the band, and he's stated that he doesn't necessarily consider himself the band's leader. He describes King Crimson as "a way of doing things", and notes that he never originally intended to be seen as the head of the group.
History
1960s
In August 1967, drummer
Michael Giles and his brother and bassist,
Peter, advertised for a singing organist.
Robert Fripp, a guitarist who didn't sing, responded. The trio of
Giles, Giles and Fripp was formed and they recorded one album together,
The Cheerful Insanity of Giles, Giles and Fripp.
The initial band was changing, however, as their debut record hadn't been particularly successful, even being eschewed by
Keith Moon of
The Who in a magazine review. The first musician to be added to their new line-up was the multi-instrumentalist
Ian McDonald on keyboards,
reeds and woodwinds. McDonald had been writing songs with lyricist
Peter Sinfield who also joined the new group which briefly included
Fairport Convention singer
Judy Dyble. Fripp's childhood friend, singer-guitarist
Greg Lake, was recruited by the others, and replaced Peter Giles on bass, also singing for the band.
King Crimson made their live debut on
April 9 1969, The sound of the album has been described as setting the "aural antecedent" for
alternative rock and
grunge, whilst the softer tracks are described as having an "ethereal" and "almost sacred" feel. Music reviewer Annie Gaffney wrote that they were credited with starting the entire
progressive rock movement that was popular in the early 1970s.
After playing shows in
England, the band embarked on a tour of the United States, performing alongside many contemporary popular musicians and musical groups, and "astounding audiences and critics" with their original sound.
Elton John was considered as a singer for the album. Lake departed in early 1970 to form
Emerson, Lake & Palmer, leaving King Crimson without a vocalist until Gordon Haskell joined the group. Haskell took over singing, in addition to playing bass for the band's third album,
Lizard, The remaining members undertook a tour of the
United States the following year, with the intention of disbanding afterwards. Shortly after the
Earthbound tour, Collins, Wallace and Burrell left King Crimson to form a band called Snape, with British blues guitarist
Alexis Korner. violin, viola and keyboard player
David Cross; With Sinfield gone, the band recruited a new lyricist, Wetton's friend
Richard Palmer-James. The album was noted for its revolutionary sound (exemplified by such pieces as
the title track in its two parts), which was a significant change from what King Crimson had done before, Muir left the group in early 1973 following an on-stage injury. During the lengthy tour that followed, the remaining members began assembling material for their next album,
Starless and Bible Black, released in January 1974, earning them a positive
Rolling Stone review. Most of the album was recorded from live performances,
Red has been described as "an impressive achievement" for a group about to disband, with "intensely dynamic" musical chemistry between the band members that resulted in a record "aggressive and loud enough to strip the wallpaper off your living room wall". McDonald had plans to rejoin as a full-time member of King Crimson while Fripp, increasingly disillusioned with the music business, was turning his attention to the writings of the mystic
George Gurdjieff, and didn't want to tour as he felt that the "
world was coming to an end". Technical issues with some of the original tapes rendered some of David Cross' violin parts inaudible when mixed in 1974, so
Eddie Jobson was brought in to provide studio overdubs of violin and keyboards. Further edits were also necessary to allow for the time limitations of a single vinyl album.
1980s
Early in 1981, Fripp considered forming a new group, with no intention of reforming King Crimson;
Peter Gabriel, and others. Besides being a bass player, Levin brought a new sound with the use of the
Chapman Stick, described as an "utterly original style" created by "one of New York City's most sought-after studio musicians". Fripp also contacted guitarist
Adrian Belew, who was on tour with
Talking Heads and had previously worked with
David Bowie and
Frank Zappa. Fripp had never been in a band with another guitarist before so the decision to seek a second guitarist was indicative of Fripp's desire to create a sound unlike previous incarnations of King Crimson. supported by
The Lounge Lizards.
By October 1981, the band had begun using the name King Crimson. was the first King Crimson album not to have been produced by a member of the group, This theme was reflected in the music with song titles such as "
Neal and
Jack and Me" and "
The Howler", with Belew even being asked by Fripp to read Keroauc's novel
On the Road. which can be attributed in part to the work of both Belew and Fripp with Talking Heads and David Bowie, Levin's work with Peter Gabriel, and Fripp's solo album
Exposure and side project
League of Gentlemen. With this new band, described by
J. D. Considine in
The New Rolling Stone Album Guide as having a "jaw-dropping technique" of "knottily rhythmic, harmonically demanding workouts", besides starting the
Guitar Craft music school in 1985. This "double trio" formation released the
EP VROOOM in 1994, followed by the studio album
THRAK in 1995, and the challenging
avantgarde live album
THRaKaTTaK in 1996. The new King Crimson sound featured elements of the interlocking guitars on
Discipline and the heavy rock feel of
Red. whilst being in tune with the sound of alternative rock musicians in the mid-1990s. However, the grandiose project of having King Crimson with six band members didn't last for long.
In the late 1990s, Discipline Global Mobile began to feature not only the works of King Crimson, but also of side projects. ProjeKcts
One,
Two,
Three, and
Four, were each a splinter group (a "
fraKctalisation", according to Fripp) of King Crimson. They released various recordings, demonstrating the
improvisational musical high wire act that the constituent musicians are able to produce.
By the time the ProjeKcts were complete, Bruford and Levin had ceased to be involved with King Crimson, leaving to work with
Earthworks and
Peter Gabriel/
Seal respectively.
The ConstruKction of Light was criticized for lacking new ideas, as was
Heaven and Earth. during which their lead singer
Maynard James Keenan humorously commented: "For me, being on stage with King
Crimson is like
Lenny Kravitz playing with
Led Zeppelin, or
Britney Spears onstage with
Debbie Gibson." and in 2003 the studio album
The Power to Believe came out with the band touring in support of it. In late November 2003,
Trey Gunn announced his departure from the band. Levin would become the active bassist of King Crimson again, with the subsequent line-up scheduled for rehearsals in 2008 and consisting of Fripp, Belew, Mastelotto, Levin plus a second drummer, Gavin Harrison of Porcupine Tree, who joined King Crimson in November 2007.. The new ProjeKct
Six, consisting only of Fripp and Belew, toured in 2006 playing shows in the United States and
Japan. However, one of these shows was postponed due to the sudden death of Adrian Belew's long-time friend and engineer, Ken Latchney. ProjeKct Six was eventually launched as a live performing unit, touring the U.S. in the fall of 2006, opening for
Porcupine Tree.
The 2000s also saw the reunion of former King Crimson members from the band's first four albums, the
21st Century Schizoid Band, who toured playing material from the band's early period. Of note, former member
Boz Burrell died on
September 21 2006 following a
heart attack, and five months later, former member
Ian Wallace died of
oesophageal cancer on
February 22 2007.
Musical style
Fripp has described King Crimson as "a way of doing things", As a result of this influence,
In the Court of the Crimson King is frequently viewed as the nominal starting point of the
symphonic rock or
progressive rock movements.
Steve Reich, and
Terry Riley.
Musical themes
While the group constantly creates new sounds and new pieces, several themes have remained constant from the earliest versions of the band to the present. The most obvious of these themes is composition by the use of a gradually building rhythmic motif. The Holst piece
Mars that the original King Crimson played is a clear example of this, with its complex pulse in 5/4 time over which strings and winds, or
mellotron in the case of King Crimson, play a skirling melody. This piece evolved into "The Devil's Triangle", based on variations of the central theme of
Mars, split into three parts which were increasingly removed from the original
Mars, on the
In the Wake of Poseidon album. It was followed by many other forms, from "The Talking Drum" in 1973 (on
Larks' Tongues in Aspic), "Industry" in 1984 (on
Three of a Perfect Pair) all the way to "Dangerous Curves" in 2003 (on
The Power to Believe).
A second recurring theme is an instrumental piece, often embedded as a break in a song, in which the band plays a passage of considerable rhythmic and
polyrhythmic complexity. One of King Crimson's best-known songs,
21st Century Schizoid Man, is an early example. The series of pieces collectively titled
Larks' Tongues in Aspic, as well as pieces of similar intent, such as "THRAK" and "Level Five", go deeper into polyrhythmic complexity, delving into rhythms that wander into and out of general synchronisation with each other, yet through polyrhythmic synchronisation all 'finish' together. These polyrhythms are abundant in the band's 1980s work, which contained gamelan-like rhythmic layers and continual
staccato patterns overlaying each other.
Another theme is the composition of difficult passages for individual instruments, especially Fripp's guitar, notably during "Fracture" on
Starless and Bible Black. Most of the band's performances over the years have included at least one stand-alone improvisation where the band simply started playing and took the music wherever it went, sometimes including passages of restrained
silence (as with Bill Bruford's contribution to the improvised "Trio"). The earliest example of an unambiguously improvising King Crimson on record is the spacious, oft-criticised extended middle-section of "Moonchild" from
In the Court of the Crimson King, in which the composed parts act as to the improvisation.
What differentiates King Crimson's approach from most other jazz and rock groups is that Crimson's improvisation avoids the notion of one soloist at a time taking centre stage while the rest of the band lays back and plays along with established rhythm and chord changes. Rather, King Crimson improvisation is a group affair, a kind of organic music-making process in which each member of the band is able to make creative decisions and contributions as the music is being played. Individual soloing is largely eschewed; each musician is to listen to each other and to the group sound, to be able to react creatively within the group dynamic. David Cross described the process in this manner: "We're so different from each other that one night someone in the band will play something that the rest of us have never heard before and you just have to listen for a second. Then you react to his statement, usually in a different way than they'd expect. It's the improvisation that makes the group amazing for me. You know, taking chances. There is no format really in which we fall into. We discover things while improvising and if they're really basically good ideas we try and work them in as new numbers, all the while keeping the improvisation thing alive and continually expanding." They vary so much in sound that King Crimson has been able to release several albums consisting entirely of improvised music, such as the
THRaKaTTaK album. Occasionally, particular improvised pieces will be performed in different forms at different shows, becoming more and more refined and eventually appearing on official
studio releases (the most recent example being "Power to Believe III", which originally existed as the stage improvisation "Deception of the Thrush", a piece played onstage for a long time before appearing on record).
Influence on other bands
King Crimson have been influential both on the early 1970s progressive rock movement and numerous contemporary artists. Bands such as
Genesis and
Yes were influenced by the band's initial style of symphonic mellotron rock. with their vocalist
Maynard James Keenan even joking that "now you know who we ripped off. Just don't tell anyone, especially the members of King Crimson".
Nirvana are known to have been influenced by King Crimson as a result of
Kurt Cobain having mentioned the importance of the
Red album to him. The band
Porcupine Tree is influenced by King Crimson, Voivod also did a cover of '21st Century Schizoid Man on their 1997 recording
Phobos.
Membership
King Crimson has had 18 musicians pass through its ranks as full band members. Many others have collaborated with the band at various points in lyric-writing, the studio and in live performance. Most of the musicians who have been members of King Crimson had notable musical careers outside the band, to the extent that it has been calculated that there are over a thousand releases on which members and former members of King Crimson appear. In a 2007 interview drummer Pat Mastelotto reported that the 2008 line-up of King Crimson will include another band member to join him on the drums, later named as
Gavin Harrison of the band
Porcupine Tree, making him the first British band member to join King Crimson since 1972.
Current band
Former members
Greg Lake — bass and vocals (1969–1970)
Michael Giles — drums and vocals (1969–1970)
Ian McDonald — saxophone, Clarinet, flute, mellotron and vocals (1969) Also appeared on the album Red in 1974.
Peter Sinfield — lyrics and synthesizer (1969–1971)
Mel Collins — saxophone, flute, vocals and mellotron (1970–1972) Also appeared on the album Red in 1974.
Gordon Haskell — bass and vocals (1970)
Andy McCulloch — drums (1970)
Boz Burrell — bass and vocals (1971–1972)
Ian Wallace — drums and vocals (1971–1972)
John Wetton — bass and vocals (1972–1974)
Jamie Muir — percussion (1972–1973)
Bill Bruford — drums, percussion (1972–1998)
David Cross — violin, viola, flute, mellotron and electric piano (1972–1974)
Richard Palmer-James — lyrics (1972–1974)
Trey Gunn — Warr guitar and Chapman stick (1994–2003)
Additional and guest musicians
Peter Giles, brother of Michael Giles and a member of Giles, Giles & Fripp, played bass on King Crimson's second album In the Wake of Poseidon, whilst Greg Lake only did vocals on the album. The band's jazz-influenced sound on the albums Lizard and Islands is largely the responsibility of the guest musicians who played with them around this time. They included Keith Tippett on piano and several musicians involved in his jazz sextet, such as Mark Charig on cornet, Nick Evans on trombone and Harry Miller on double bass, as well as classical musicians Robin Miller on oboe and Paulina Lucas on vocals. Jon Anderson of the band Yes was also responsible for the lead vocals on the opening movement of the title track of the Lizard album. In early 1975 Eddie Jobson overdubbed new violin and electric piano parts on some tracks of the USA album. Some of the musicians who played with the band on Lizard re-surfaced to contribute to the Red album. Whilst not a performing musician, Adrian Belew's then-wife Margaret wrote the lyrics to the song "Two Hands" from the Beat album in 1982.
Studio album discography
In the Court of the Crimson King (October 1969); US #28 UK #3 Gold
In the Wake of Poseidon (May 1970); US #31 UK #4
Lizard (December 1970); US #113 UK #29
Islands (December 1971); US #76 UK #30
Larks' Tongues in Aspic (April 1973); US #61 UK #20
Starless and Bible Black (June 1974); US #64 UK #28
Red (October 1974); US #66
Discipline (1981); US #45
Beat (1982); US #52
Three of a Perfect Pair (1984); US #58 UK #30
THRAK (1995); US #83
The ConstruKction of Light (2000)
The Power to Believe (2003); US #150Further Information
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