IN THE COURT OF THE CRIMSON KING

I suppose it's time. What a monolith this album is. 1969, picture rocking Jefferson Airplane and then throwing this on, must have been whacked, poor hippies. Anyway, one of the greatest albums ever, truly innovative in it's use of jazz and classical as a basis instead of blues. This format had been meddled with before, with bands like The Moody Blues using classical and bands like The Doors using jazz, but both and to this degree had not been done until this album (or at least this successfully) which laid the foundation for all of prog and influenced metal a great deal too. 21st Century Schizoid Man was the most intense song since Mars, The Bringer of War (which KC covered) when it was released. Later of course the band would release Red, the most intense album yet released. I Talk to the Wind is a relaxing ballad that gives me images of a solitary freedom, a lonliness, but a manly lonliness, overlooking some small town by the sea with the wind swirling off the cliff in front of me. Epitaph is one of the most epic laments of all time. The imagery in it is just so... gah, epic; "Upon the instruments of death (mellotron, jk) the sunlight brightly gleams". Moonchild is a track that people hate on unjustly. The beginning is of course eerie and great, but I also think the jam is good. It's quite relaxing and you can picture alot of eerie sh*t happening. It's a part that you're not supposed to pay too much attention to. The title track is ultra epic of course, especially the chorus, you all know it. At any rate, one of KC's best, probably 3rd, behind Larks' Tongues and Red.