STARLESS AND BIBLE BLACK

King Crimson was very productive in this "metal-crimson" episode, releasing three studio albums within two years. Starless and Bible Black is the follow-up of Larques Tongues in Aspic and is a bit equal in it's sound, although the first three songs also reminds me of the first episode of KC (In the Court - Lizard).

- Side 1 - "The Great Deciever" is a happy psychedelic rock song, which has some jazz riffs like in "20th first century schizoid man". A fast opening track with some strange surroundings to get our attention! "Lament" starts as a great progressive rock ballad, but turns into an agressive prog rock monster: great song. Also in this composition some of the riffs do remind me of the earlier Crimson records, which I do like. Side one contains more progrockballads and silent and abstract progjams.

- Side 2 - The job for the vocalist is done: side two contains two composition without vocals. The first - the titletrack of the record - is a subtle, abstract spacerockjam with lots of fuzzy guitars and mellotrons and the second is a progressive metal compositions. Especially the titletrack is really nice and original. The second composition should have fit as well on the larques tonques as on this record.

Starless and Bible Black is generally seen as a bit less good then the Larques Tongues and Red, but the quality is equally high in my opinion. If this was made by a different band it would have been a must-have, but we are getting used by the quality offerings of KC. I think that the titletrack, Lament and the Nightwatch are all 5 star productions and the others are worth 4 stars, which makes this record as a whole a really great listening experience: 5 stars.