Crimson are good shocker!!

BaldFriede wrote: Winter Wine wrote: BaldFriede wrote: If a lot of bands have been influenced by an album, it certainly means to me the album was progressive (ahead of the time). Don't you agree? Have a look at the dictionary definition of progressive: pro·gres·sive    ( P )  Pronunciation Key  (pr-grsv) adj. Moving forward; advancing. Proceeding in steps; continuing steadily by increments: progressive change. Promoting or favoring progress toward better conditions or new policies, ideas, or methods: a progressive politician; progressive business leadership. Progressive Of or relating to a Progressive Party: the Progressive platform of 1924. Of or relating to progressive education: a progressive school. Increasing in rate as the taxable amount increases: a progressive income tax. Pathology. Tending to become more severe or wider in scope: progressive paralysis. Grammar. Designating a verb form that expresses an action or condition in progress. Definition number 3 would apply here. It's not a PROGRESSIVE rock album, but it has influenced other bands. How is that hard to understand? We obviously have a different understanding of the word "progressive". If a band produced an album that was very influential for the development of several other bands that came afterwards, that band certainly was progressive (ahead of the time).

 Yes we do.

Well I see where you're coming from but 'Never Mind The Bollox' influenced a lot of bands, Obviously, So does that mean that it was a progressive rock album?

BaldFriede wrote: Interestingly, I think yes. It brought kick-ass back into prog, something that had gone lost. Just look at albums like "Wind and Wuthering" or "The Wall"; whatever one may say about them, but they certainly don't kick ass.

arcer wrote: many moons ago I bought "In the Court of the Crimson King" by King Crimson. This, I was told, was a seminal prog album, the motherlode almost, the record which spawned a generation of wondrous prog excess. So I parted with my cash for the umpteenth reissiue of the album and slapped it eagerly into the CD player. And.... Yawn!!!!! I found it boring, too wrapped in meandering 60s pyschedelia, too fey, too ambitious for its own good and I hated the vocals. In short it put me off the band for good. At least so I thought. For some reason I went back to KC of months ago, on a whim, after reading one of the reviews of Red here. I nabbed myself a copy and I am.... astounded. What an amazing album. It's angular, grinding, angry, tricksome, smooth, clever, intricate, unwieldy, brutal and delicate all at the same time. It is a completely different band. This could have been recorded last week, so timeless are its ideas and the execution of them. I'm amazed and slightly shame-faced for I've a fair amount of time on this site berating Crimson, all on the strength of their first album, which I still consider to be weak. I know that's heresy but after hearing Red I ploughed on through Lark's Tongues and Islands and they are both better than In tghe Court. To the people who have listened to KC's debut and shrugged your shoulders at its dubious charms: Go and buy Red. You owe it to yourself. It's an amazing record and by band who amazed me at the thoroughness of their bold reinvention.

      Congratulations, you may have just discovered that there is a
mysterious process in music known as "development", which is closely
related to another phenomenon known in historical circles as "history",
something terribly lacking in most of the reviews here. It's a big shock to
many card carrying prog lovers to realize that prog didn't always exist,
and that certain risk-taking musicians actually had to invent it first. Most
of these guys were pot-smoking, vegetarian hippies at the time, and if
the early efforts sounded psychedelic, that's because that's where all
those ideas got started. While you may be bored by that sort of thing
from the vantage point of your super modern cybernetic life-style of
today, you should be bloody appreciative that they had the balls to take
those chances and create that stuff, or you might still be dancing the
twist.

goose wrote: BaldFriede wrote: Interestingly, I think yes. It brought kick-ass back into prog, something that had gone lost. Just look at albums like "Wind and Wuthering" or "The Wall"; whatever one may say about them, but they certainly don't kick ass. Just checking you mean "rock", rather than "prog" there.

I mean prog had turned "schmaltzy", and a punk infusion was badly needed to get the lard out of the asses.

I've yet to hear In The Court.... but I already have Red, Lizard and Islands and with the exception of the last one, their brilliant.

My Dad had a similar experience, he listened to In The Court... when it came out and wasnt impressed but he didnt bother with any of their following work. Over christmas I played him Lizard and he now admits that he should have carried on listening to them. Only took him 36 years. 

arcer wrote:

      Congratulations, you may have just discovered that there is a
mysterious process in music known as "development", which is closely
related to another phenomenon known in historical circles as "history",
something terribly lacking in most of the reviews here. It's a big shock to
many card carrying prog lovers to realize that prog didn't always exist,
and that certain risk-taking musicians actually had to invent it first. Most
of these guys were pot-smoking, vegetarian hippies at the time, and if
the early efforts sounded psychedelic, that's because that's where all
those ideas got started. While you may be bored by that sort of thing
from the vantage point of your super modern cybernetic life-style of
today, you should be bloody appreciative that they had the balls to take
those chances and create that stuff, or you might still be dancing the
twist.[/QUOTE]

Hmm seem to have hit a raw nerve here.
1. My "modern cybernetic lifetsytyle" extends to being able to work Microsoft Word. I'm old enought to remember DSOTM being released so I think my ability to judge a work on its historical and artistic merit is well developed.
2. I fully appreciate the place ITCOTCK has in the annals of prog but I still believe it to be a pretty mediocre album. I feel the same way about a lot of other albums that have attracted a wealth of received wisdom. For example: Never Mind the Bollocks, which BaldFriede mentioned was a groundbreaking record and has attrracted huge amounts of critical acclaim. Personally I find much of it to be poor. There are a few outstanding moments but only the couple of things that informed the first couple of iconic singles. Nirvana's Nevermind is the same for me, aside from the obvious 'Smells like teen spirt', 'Come As You Are' and 'In Bloom' it's poor. 'Piper at the Gates of Dawn' is the same. Groundbreaking in context, but they have not lasted the test of time.
'Red' is a far more accomplished, interesting and artistically complete album (for me) than ITCOTCK. In fact I would say the same for Islands and Lark's Tongues. Indeed I went out and got Discipline on the strength of someone here's recommendation and THAT is better than ITCOTCK. An album's place in the pantheon of progressive albums should not rest on its historic significance alone. It should stand the test of critical comparison down the years. ITCOTCK does not do that.
3. That appears to be borne out by the comments here. The majority of the respondents to the thread rate ITCOCK as an album that has dated badly and scores lower than later work by the band. It's place in the pantheon, it would appear, is solely based on its historical merit. A case, as happens so often, of an album's reputation protecting it from honest evaluation.
4. Actually, come to think of it, I never dissed its historical merit or denied it. I merely said it was a poor album, an opinion I adhere to.
[/QUOTE]
You said "Yawn!!!!! I found it boring, too wrapped in meandering 60s pyschedelia, too fey, too ambitious for its own good and I hated the vocals.
In short it put me off the band for good."

Well, what did you expect? The album was recorded in 1968, when nobody regarded these "meandering 60s psychedelia" as boring; on the contrary, everyone found them exciting.

You also call the album "fey"; a very interesting choice of words. Here a dictionary entry about "fey":

Main Entry: fey
Function: adjective
Etymology: Middle English feye, from Old English f[AE]ge; akin to Old High German feigi fey and perhaps to Old English fAh hostile, outlawed -- more at FOE
1 a chiefly Scottish : fated to die : DOOMED b : marked by a foreboding of death or calamity
2 a : able to see into the future : VISIONARY b : marked by an otherworldly air or attitude c : CRAZY, TOUCHED
3 a : PRECIOUS 3 b : UNCONVENTIONAL, CAMPY
- fey·ly adverb
- fey·ness noun

Now which meaning of fey did you mean?

BaldFriede wrote: arcer wrote:       Congratulations, you may have just discovered that there is a mysterious process in music known as "development", which is closely related to another phenomenon known in historical circles as "history", something terribly lacking in most of the reviews here. It's a big shock to many card carrying prog lovers to realize that prog didn't always exist, and that certain risk-taking musicians actually had to invent it first. Most of these guys were pot-smoking, vegetarian hippies at the time, and if the early efforts sounded psychedelic, that's because that's where all those ideas got started. While you may be bored by that sort of thing from the vantage point of your super modern cybernetic life-style of today, you should be bloody appreciative that they had the balls to take those chances and create that stuff, or you might still be dancing the twist.

Hmm seem to have hit a raw nerve here.
1. My "modern cybernetic lifetsytyle" extends to being able to work Microsoft Word. I'm old enought to remember DSOTM being released so I think my ability to judge a work on its historical and artistic merit is well developed.
2. I fully appreciate the place ITCOTCK has in the annals of prog but I still believe it to be a pretty mediocre album. I feel the same way about a lot of other albums that have attracted a wealth of received wisdom. For example: Never Mind the Bollocks, which BaldFriede mentioned was a groundbreaking record and has attrracted huge amounts of critical acclaim. Personally I find much of it to be poor. There are a few outstanding moments but only the couple of things that informed the first couple of iconic singles. Nirvana's Nevermind is the same for me, aside from the obvious 'Smells like teen spirt', 'Come As You Are' and 'In Bloom' it's poor. 'Piper at the Gates of Dawn' is the same. Groundbreaking in context, but they have not lasted the test of time.
'Red' is a far more accomplished, interesting and artistically complete album (for me) than ITCOTCK. In fact I would say the same for Islands and Lark's Tongues. Indeed I went out and got Discipline on the strength of someone here's recommendation and THAT is better than ITCOTCK. An album's place in the pantheon of progressive albums should not rest on its historic significance alone. It should stand the test of critical comparison down the years. ITCOTCK does not do that.
3. That appears to be borne out by the comments here. The majority of the respondents to the thread rate ITCOCK as an album that has dated badly and scores lower than later work by the band. It's place in the pantheon, it would appear, is solely based on its historical merit. A case, as happens so often, of an album's reputation protecting it from honest evaluation.
4. Actually, come to think of it, I never dissed its historical merit or denied it. I merely said it was a poor album, an opinion I adhere to.
[/QUOTE]
You said "Yawn!!!!! I found it boring, too wrapped in meandering 60s pyschedelia, too fey, too ambitious for its own good and I hated the vocals.
In short it put me off the band for good."

Well, what did you expect? The album was recorded in 1968, when nobody regarded these "meandering 60s psychedelia" as boring; on the contrary, everyone found them exciting.

You also call the album "fey"; a very interesting choice of words. Here a dictionary entry about "fey":

Main Entry: fey
Function: adjective
Etymology: Middle English feye, from Old English f[AE]ge; akin to Old High German feigi fey and perhaps to Old English fAh hostile, outlawed -- more at FOE
1 a chiefly Scottish : fated to die : DOOMED b : marked by a foreboding of death or calamity
2 a : able to see into the future : VISIONARY b : marked by an otherworldly air or attitude c : CRAZY, TOUCHED
3 a : PRECIOUS 3 b : UNCONVENTIONAL, CAMPY
- fey·ly adverb
- fey·ness noun

Now which meaning of fey did you mean?
[/QUOTE]

fey as in  3a: precious. As in a little contrived, wrapped up in its own otherwordliness and not in a good way. I choose my words carefully. And know the meaning of them.

And I expected a transcendant album of progressive greatness - as the unwarranted status devoted to it seemed to promise. It didn't deliver. It is more the fault of the hype rather than the album itself, which is merely adequate. Historically important but not the 'album for all time' it is reckoned to be.

I appreciate the sentiment Friede, but I've had ITCOTCK for going on six years and have found, over a substantial number of listens, little in it that thrills me. I can happily accept its place in prog hirstory as a landmark album but in retrospect I think most will agree that it has aged badly. Red is a far more articulate and cohesive statement. I'll accept too that ITCOTCK was a revolutionary recording, but while that record has, I feel, fared badly with the passage of time, Red really could have been recorded this year. It, to my ears, is timelessly adventurous, whereas ITCOTCK, to my ears, is little more than an interesting curio at this stage, a record that is the aural equivalent of That Was the Week that Was - the birthplace of so much good comedy but which was better realised by those who got their break on that show, later on in their careers (Python et al). The former programme is now a frozen moment in time forever associated with its era, the latter still has resonance today.
And saying I should listen to it with the right perspective is tantamount to admitting its limitations, don't you think?
Anybody else believe its wildly overrated? Maybe you're right. It's not unknown for me to be completely wrong .... (though not very often )


Edited by arcer

Well, I don't think it has dated at all, and I still listen to it often and enjoy it every time. And you misunderstand my comment about "right perspective"; that only refers to your criticism of the "meandering 60s psychedelia". In fact these "meandering psychedelia" are very much loved by me, and I miss them in many of today's albums (which I call "trite"). I also have a different name for these "meandering psychedelia"; I call them "free flights of imagination".

BaldFriede wrote: ... and it was not for nothing that Steve Hackett did renditions of "I talk to the Wind" and "In the Court of the Crimson King" in some of his concerts (with the help of some King Crimson musicians, like Ian McDonald and John Wetton)

I have the Tokyo Tapes dvd and those renditions are great, I only wish though that they had played some Crimson from the Wetton era (although the one Asia song and the song Battlelines from one of Wetton's solo albums were quite good).