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King Crimson... I must have been hiding under a rock

VinylHanger

VinylHanger

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I was poking through the 3 for a buck tapes at GW and stumbled upon King Crimson-A Young Person's Guide to King Crimson. I have to admit, I have never knowingly heard anything from King Crimson before this. This stuff rocks, I am on the hunt for the vinyl now. If the sound quality of the tape is any gauge then the vinyl should be awesome.

Anybody have any suggestions for other albums to look for?
 
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The "Young Persons Guide" vinyl has the albums listed that each of the tunes come from, I don't know if the tape does as well. Start with your favorite song and buy that album, eventually you'll own the first 7 studio albums.

Here's my ranking of the first 7 studio albums:

1. Red
2. Court of the Crimson King
3. Wake of Poseidon
4. Starless and Bible Black
5. Larks Tongue in Aspic
6. Islands
7. Lizard

My ranking changes depending on which lineup I'm in the mood for. Generally Red and Court are on top and Lizard is always on the bottom.

If you go nuts like I did then next you'll buy the 3 early 80's albums, Discipline, Beat, and Three of a Perfect Pair. They were made in that order and that's how I'd rank them as well. They sound more 80's and less classic prog rock.

If you're looking for something with a more modern metal sound then the last three albums (only on CD), Thrak, The Construction of Light, and The Power to Believe might be up your alley.

On top of all of those studio records there's piles upon piles of individual shows available at https://www.dgmlive.com/shop.htm.

Wow, I've gone on way too long. So to summarize: buy Red and Court, you won't be disappointed.
 
Me too, VinylHanger!!! Just discovered K.C. after years of hearing what a badass Robert Fripp is.

Of course I just 'discovered' what badass really means, having bought countless Roy Buchanon and Jeff Beck albums in the last 2 years. :yes:
 
This is my favorite part of AK. Learning about new music. Thanks for all the info I am on the hunt for the suggested tunage.
 
VinylHanger said:
I was poking through the 3 for a buck tapes at GW and stumbled upon King Crimson-A Young Person's Guide to King Crimson. I have to admit, I have never knowingly heard anything from King Crimson before this. This stuff rocks, I am on the hunt for the vinyl now. If the sound quality of the tape is any gauge then the vinyl should be awesome.

Anybody have any suggestions for other albums to look for?
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I was in the same boat as you about three years ago. After owning "In the Court of the Crimson King" and "Starless and Bible Black" for about 30 years I decided I needed to hear more. I picked up everything they put out up to and including "Three of a Perfect Pair". They are all good in their own way but essentials to me are, "Larks Tongue in Aspic, "Red", "Discipline" and especially side one of "Starless and Bible Black". "The Great Deciever" box set is a 4cd live recording that is outstanding in my opinion. See if your library has any of these. Great stuff. I'll be seeing them in Chicago come August. :thmbsp:
 
ekmanning5 said:
I'll be seeing them in Chicago come August. :thmbsp:
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Ooohhhh, where's the envy smilie....







Guess this will have to do.
w00t.gif
 
ekmanning5 said:
I "The Great Deciever" box set is a 4cd live recording that is outstanding in my opinion.
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That box set is what sent me down to the path of the KC collector club and downloading torrents from their site. It showed me that the live stuff has a little more oommmpf, a little something extra, so that it doesn't sound quite as sterile as the almost always excellent studio stuff.
 
Beat
Three of a Perfect Pair
Discipline ( I like the above three the most)
Starless and Bible Black (or as Bill Bruford called it "Braless and Slightly Slack")

Almost ANY of their albums are great.
 
I agree with what Scuzzer said.

With those first 7 albums, the lineup seemingly changed with each successive release culminating with 1974's Red. King Crimson went on a 7 year hiatus after that album.

The early 80's albums (Discipline, Beat and Three Of A Perfect Pair) consisted of Adrian Belew, Tony Levin, Bill Bruford and Robert Fripp. Then they went on a 10 year hiatus reemerging in 1995 with Adrian Belew, Tony Levin, Bill Bruford, Trey Gunn, Pat Mastelotto, and Fripp. This lineup created Thrak. Fripp's double trio album. This music had a harder, more metallic edge. After Thrak Levin and Bruford left the band and King Krimson returned to a quartet releasing The ConstruKction Of Light and The Power To Believe.

I do like the 70's era King Crimson but I tend to lean more towards the Belew era of the band (1980 to current) The recent album, The Power To Believe, is very good. Thrak is another killer album.

My favorites are the live albums from the Belew era. Absent Lovers, B'Boom, Heavy ConstruKction and Vroom Vroom. And as Scuzzer mentioned, there's tons more. Tons.

And to confuse the issue even more, Fripp did a bunch of ProjeKct stuff with various members of his band in the 90's, eg., ProjeKct One, ProjeKct Two, Three, Four... you get the picture. All good stuff but that's jumping ahead a bit.

Sorry for being a bit long winded. Start with In The Court... and Red and fill in the gaps. Lizard and Islands will be the most challenging listens. Then move on to the 80's, or what I like to call the Belew era, and start with Discipline.

Cheers
 
Enjoy yourself , there is a abundance of great stuff to get into. The first seven are "the ones" IMHO. Not much of a Belew fan but some great metal on Thrak. Wake Of Posideon is much overlooked because of following ITCOTKK. Im one of those people who belong to the cult of Lizard. If you cant listen to side one...try side two..Jon Anderson vocal guest and some of the finest instrumental work done in the genre. All the Wetton/Bruford stuff is Great.
 
Any of the first 7 albums are worth it (I actually like Lizard...it has many pieces with a raging Mellotron and some REALLY beautiful pieces with Mel Collins on English Horn and Oboe). During Phase 2 (AKA "The Drive to 1981" when KK re-emerged) their first Discipline (with Adrian Belew, Bruford and Tony Levin ON THE STICK [Chapman Stick, that is]) is pretty excellent. I am less familiar with their most recent incarnation the Post-Thrak Era.

All excellent stuff though.

Welcome to the wonderful world of Robert Fripp.

BTW, get Fripp's "Exposure" CD/LP (and there's an excellent re-issue). Very unusual, but VERY edgy.
 
King Crimson is Robert Fripp. He is the band, but he gets some great musicians to join the band for various periods of time. Because of this, you get some very different types of music, but the backbone of it all remains Fripp. I don't know what vintage I like better. I love Lark's Tongue and Starless, but also really love Beat, 3 of a perfect pair and Discipline. You really can't go wrong with any of them.
 
Another of my favs is the Fripp/Brian Eno release "No Pussyfooting". Side one has some great Fripp guitar. He has a most distinctive style.
 
ekmanning5 said:
Another of my favs is the Fripp/Brian Eno release "No Pussyfooting". Side one has some great Fripp guitar. He has a most distinctive style.
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Evening Star is a more ambient eno-ish Fripp & Eno release - 'til side 2 kicks in! (An Index of Metal - wack!)

Fripp is also famous for the guitar licks on David Bowie's 'Heroes', and for the guitar on Blondies' "Fade away and Radiate" (Parallel Lines)
 
They lost me at Red

Scuzzer said:
The "Young Persons Guide" vinyl has the albums listed that each of the tunes come from, I don't know if the tape does as well. Start with your favorite song and buy that album, eventually you'll own the first 7 studio albums.

Here's my ranking of the first 7 studio albums:

1. Red
2. Court of the Crimson King
3. Wake of Poseidon
4. Starless and Bible Black
5. Larks Tongue in Aspic
6. Islands
7. Lizard

My ranking changes depending on which lineup I'm in the mood for. Generally Red and Court are on top and Lizard is always on the bottom.

If you go nuts like I did then next you'll buy the 3 early 80's albums, Discipline, Beat, and Three of a Perfect Pair. They were made in that order and that's how I'd rank them as well. They sound more 80's and less classic prog rock.

If you're looking for something with a more modern metal sound then the last three albums (only on CD), Thrak, The Construction of Light, and The Power to Believe might be up your alley.

On top of all of those studio records there's piles upon piles of individual shows available at https://www.dgmlive.com/shop.htm.

Wow, I've gone on way too long. So to summarize: buy Red and Court, you won't be disappointed.
Click to expand...
Red never did it for me but the other 70's stuff.......Larks' Tongues totally blew me away.Gawd,what beautiful noise!As for Starless,the second side is "it".live and dangerous.These two and the rest represent the pinnacle of what 70's progrock was.
 
corporalcripp said:
Red never did it for me but the other 70's stuff.......Larks' Tongues totally blew me away.Gawd,what beautiful noise!As for Starless,the second side is "it".live and dangerous.These two and the rest represent the pinnacle of what 70's progrock was.
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I normally listen to live shows that DGM offer on CD and download as opposed to the studio albums. Since they never played the Red material live I normally play the Larks and Starless era shows the most. "Live and dangerous" is where it's at with this band for me.

It's unfortunate that covert recording technology wasn't better in the 60's because it would be nice to have high quality recordings (professionally redone by DGM) of the first lineup. I still routinely listen to discs 3 and 4 of the Epitaph box set even though it sounds like it was recorded through a sock in a port-o-potty.
 
Thanks for all the replies. I will look for these. I love finding new to me music, I tend to enjoy that more than the gear these days.
 
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