I don’t make it a big secret that King Crimson is one of my all-time favorite bands. I collect all their albums (including all the CDs released under the King Crimson Collectors Club as a member from the very beginning). I have seen them more than a handful of times in concert. I’m even a current member in good standing of their VIP “1000 Club” which, as the name implies, is limited to 1000 members worldwide.
This (perhaps crazed) fandom started back in the early 1990s. I had read about them somewhere where they were described as a pioneering English progressive rock band. Members included Adrian Belew (who I knew from Frank Zappa’s late 70s band) and Bill Bruford (who I knew from the group Yes). I bought a CD called The Compact King Crimson which I thought would serve as a “best of” but I was left very confused. The first half of the CD was selections from the 80s version of the band and the second half was songs exclusively from King Crimson’s debut record, In The Court Of The Crimson King, from 1969. These two eras couldn’t sound more different! The only consistent member between the two was guitarist Robert Fripp. The liner notes of the CD offered no insights besides the band members on each song. I had to dig further.
Remember, this was before the World Wide Web existed, but there were USENET groups. I dug into alt.music.progressive for answers. There were plenty of nerdy discussions about the band that helped bring me up to speed. However, the bigger news I learned was that they had recently reformed and were about to release a new EP called Vrooom.
The lineup was brand new, and enticing to me. It was referred to as a “Double Trio” consisting of two guitarists (Robert Fripp & Adrian Belew), two drummers (Bill Bruford & Pat Mastelotto) and two basses (Tony Levin & Trey Gunn who actually played an exotic instrument called a Chapman Stick). I was very much intrigued. I special-ordered Vrooom from a local record store and awaited its arrival.
When it finally came in the mail in the winter of 1994 I eagerly put it in my CD player and was completely blown away! It had completely surpassed all my expectations. It was like a heavy metal progressive rock band with loud, complex double-drumming. Woah.
Enough of my personal back-story. Here is “Cage” from Vrooom:
Vrooom was a short EP that was supposed to serve as a preview of an upcoming full-length record called THRAK. THRAK came out 30 years ago this week (April 3, 1995) and is today’s pick!
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I bought THRAK the day it came out and I’ve listened to it so many times in the past 30 years it is tattooed in my brain. Even so, it is still endlessly replayable to me. I never get bored of it.
In between the release of Vrooom and THRAK King Crimson played a series of shows in Argentina. They almost exclusively played new songs. (Highlights from the tour were eventually released on a live album called B’Boom: Live in Argentina in the fall of 1995). Here is “Sex, Sleep, Eat, Drink, Dream” from that run of concerts:
King Crimson’s label, Virgin, actually released a single from THRAK called “Dinosaur”. The mid-1990s were wild times. They performed it on Late Nite With Conan O’Brien in November, 1995:
That song encapsulates THRAK pretty well. Complex drumming, monstrous low end, self-deprecating lyrics and completely deranged guitar.
Another thing record labels did in the 1990s was release EPKs (Electronic Press Kits) to promote new albums. Here is the THRAK EPK which has a ton of cool live footage, studio clips and interviews with the band.
Another fun promotional video they made showed the band playing a car racing video game:
The group did a lot of individual promotion of THRAK as well. This included a very in-depth interview with Robert Fripp from March of 1995 that explains how the band was formed and many of the key concepts of their sound.
Another example of their promotion was this video interview with Bill Bruford, Adrian Belew and Tony Levin before a show in Montreal in May of 1995 (Don’t worry: only the introduction is in French):
Here is another interview from that tour with Adrian Belew and Bill Bruford:
There is lots of nitty-gritty details about the music contained in these clips.
The band was very ferocious on the THRAK tour in 1995. Here they are playing “Vrooom” and “Marine: 475”:
The double-drumming is still something that blows me away. One of the songs, called “B’Boom”, is essentially a thorough-composed drum solo. Here they are playing it live:
I actually have studied this piece of music pretty intently. King Crimson released a transcription book of every song from THRAK. I have learned to play both parts of “B’Boom” over the years. In fact, I cracked open the book again today and did a little woodshedding:
The first time I saw King Crimson live was the final date of the 1995 tour: November 29th, 1995 at the Rosemont Theater in Rosemont, Illinois. It was an incredible show that I still have fond memories of. If I’m ever feeling nostalgic I can reach for my copy of Live In Chicago 1995 which is Collectors Club release of that exact show.
As much as I love all the live material from this era, nothing beat the powerful, crisp studio recordings themselves. You can hear every note perfectly of the large, unwieldy band. I’ll close this post out with the studio recording of the title track from THRAK which should hopefully be all the incentive you need to hear the entire record:
Ready to dive into the entire hour-long record? Me too (again)!
