What would an all-yankee King Crimson sound like, you ask? Here’s the answer.
Belew/Levin/Vai/Carey
Not to limit myself to a single answer to this question, but Beat is my favorite currently-active band. I hope (they’ve hinted) that they’re working on an album of original music. The primary work here, covering the music of King Crimson’s 80s ouvre, lends itself to a lot of things that I resonate with in terms of a creative approach to rock music.
They have the deepest pocket of any rock band I can think of, and I love their mathy-ness. They’re algo-rhythmic®! I hear the Beatles in this music. King Crimson’s next phase would be more overt about the connection, but the basic sonics of this band harken back in the melodicism, the collaborative writing process between Fripp and Belew, and the exacting approach to arrangements.
On the other hand, I can note the similarity of “Neon Heat Disease” to “Neon Meate Dream of a Octafish” by Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band off of Trout Mask Replica. So.. is 80s Crimson a perfect amalgam of Revolver and Trout Mask with a forward-looking technical bent? I think the case could be made by plunking the needle down on this album.
Tony Levin is the second vocalist on this, and he’s also taken over keyboards from Fripp. He also provided many of the photographs of the band that grace the inside of this triple gatefold and booklet. His presence in this re-imagining of the original music is vital to its success.
Steve Vai’s replacement of Fripp works because there’s a line he treads between copying and originating. He has to honor that huge presence that would otherwise be missing without disappearing as a separate entity. One early indication of how he approached this is his solo in Heartbeat. It sounds like electric erhu. That’s a really cool way to interpret Fripp’s playing and take it somewhere else entirely at the same time, by adding an unexpected third element. There’s nascent world-music ambitions in the 80s Crimson music sourced here, and adding sonics that suggest new contexts is absolutely in keeping.
What Danny Carey adds most significantly here is that he plays all of these songs on a set of acoustic drums. I think the music from the later source albums is greatly improved by this one change. I don’t recall seeing any electronic drums in Carey’s setup from the show (you can correct me if you know different) and the essential liveness of the sounds he provides raises all of the music from the second and third albums up to the sonic level of the first album. I get that Bruford wanted to push the envelope on the sound palate he was using, but this live recording makes an excellent case for the irreplaceability of percussion sounds coming from skin and bone, not curated electrons.
This is one of my most important objects from my move back to analog music. I love vinyl in all its machine-age glory. Carey’s drumming here is evidence for my case. Music must be made by flesh and bone and all of the worldly materials. I fully believe that, and here’s some strong evidence.
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If, if Reagan played disco He’d shoot it to shit. You can’t disco in jack boots.
High upon a white horse He’d sing lame lyrics To try to reach the working man. –The Minutemen, 1982
That’s the entire lyrics to If Reagan Played Disco by southern California punk band the Minutemen, released as one of five songs on a seven inch vinyl record entitled “bean-spill e. p.”
Here’s my copy: Sorry, I will only be posting the non-obscene label here…
This cultural artifact from 43 years ago shows that the issues that seem so immediate and emergent right now have been with us for decades. The Republican conservative project has been the same for all this time. The Democratic response has been just that – a weak, ineffectual response. The Democrats initiate nothing. All they seem to do is talk in the least effective/offensive way about vaguely lefty ideas they never enact, while governing like diet Republicans.
The real response to what’s happening in the world now comes from outside the corporate infrastructure, in places like the LAVA Center, citizen political groups, spaces that hold independent artists, writers, musicians and other creatives, who exist outside that structure. We are purified in our intentions because we exist outside the mainstream.
The mission of mainstream cultural money and power is to blind us to what’s real, to create an artificially rarified sense of what qualifies as legitimate cultural contribution so that anything real – anything you’d recognize as coming from someone’s real life and intention is seen as substandard — grubby and grimy, faulty, unwashed and obscene.
Because the truth is obscene. We see the IDF shooting Palestinian children in the head, carpet bombing and starving an entire people out of existence. And in the Palestinian people we should see ourselves. The big money, the power of industry, and world leadership supplies the bullets to, as our president says, “finish the job.”
“The job” is to diminish working people, out of existence if necessary. Their mission is to fill us with artificial hopes and synthetic mass-manufactured bullshit dreams, all the while eroding all of the real value – the compassion and care, the pride, the willingness to work to better each other and ourselves together, the simple beauty of the world around us – and turn it all into a zero-sum game, a race to gobble up that which has more value if left alone, those things that will grow if nurtured but can only wither if exploited.
Our job is that nurturing, and we’re doing it now: sharing our hearts, hearing each other. It’s the same job the Minutemen were doing decades ago. “If Reagan Played Disco.” In those words, there is a dream. It’s the same dream that had that lone student standing in front of a line of tanks in Beijing not so long after this record was made.
Some say that student’s name was Wang Weilin. The Chinese government says there was no such person. It’s said he was 19 years old when he stood in front of those tanks. It’s said he was arrested for “political hooliganism,” whatever that means. Now, nobody can prove he existed or if he exists still, in some gulag somewhere. But we know who he is, because of what he did – what we all saw him do, even though his country’s government denies it ever happened.
D. Boon, the guitarist and singer of the Minutemen died in the band van when it rolled while they were on tour, three years after this record was released. These grooves are part of his corpse. After he died, his fellow band members George Hurley and Mike Watt continued on.
Years later, they recorded a drop-dead gorgeous instrumental called “Tien An Men Dream Again” as fIREHOSE, with guitarist Ed fROMOHIO.
Syd Barrett was the original leading light of Pink Floyd, but succumbed to debilitating psychological issues that began around the time of the release of the band’s first album. He left the band under a cloud after a short struggle to continue contributing, and after two erratic solo albums, left the music business entirely. Barrett, his second solo album, was the end of the road for Syd as a recording artist.
It’s sssssooooo wwwwweeeeiiiirrrrrddddddddd, but it’s also surprisingly good considering the problems involved in making it, and different from anything else you might care to name in rock music.
The first thing I think of with Syd’s solo stuff is wild tempo shifts and a casual attitude towards pitch, but there’s less out-of-control-ness than you might think on Barrett. I mean, it’s loose, at times almost chaotic, but I think Syd was a lot more on top of things for this record than his rep might suggest.
“Gigolo Aunt,” for instance is prime late-sixties pop rock, as is “Baby Lemonade.” The shuffling beats, the psychedelic brightness, the unique phrasing and viewpoint — all are trademark, and testament to Barrett’s distinctive creativity.
The band is Syd on vocals and guitar, Richard Wright on keys, Jeff Shirley from Humble Pie on drums, and David Gilmour on bass and backing vocals. Gilmour and Wright are the producers. At Gilmour’s insistance, Syd plays all the guitars.
Ultimately, it’s both its own thing – loose and immediate, quirky and streamlined – and a reminder of what might have been.
I’m listening to Hand. Cannot. Erase. by Steven Wilson and it’s a remarkable experience.
My copy ofHand. Cannot. Erase. by Steven Wilson
It came out in 2015. Wikipedia tells me it’s his fourth solo album, since deactivating Porcupine Tree after the less-than-successful The Incident (an album I liked, though they’ve made better.)
This album is proggy af. Synths, time signature shenanigans, lots of notes, two 10+ minutes-long tracks… and yet it feels contemporary. If Classic Rock™ were still a thing as of 10 years ago, this album would definitely qualify. I hear the influences, and the originality. This is a Contender, an album that should be in the pantheon.
I’m listening now and it soothes me. The election THE GODDAMN ELECTION is 8 days away and I have little hope that things are going to be OK. There is a charismatic cult leader openly running for president, describing the fascist policies he intends to implement publicly, and the supposed “normie” (but also authoritarian and a genocide) alternative is barely hanging on to a lead in the current polling. The only person in the race whom I think might have a chance of setting this country on the right path has absolutely no chance of winning. It’s a scary time.
But this album is good, thoughtful, and human. The playing here reminds me that there is virtue in people, and that that virtue… great musicianship, great music production, a clear eye expressed in the lyrics of these songs, originality… can still happen.
I’ll talk about these in alpha order since I can’t think of a better rubric. These are the five things I brought with me for a trip east from Colorado with my brother. He brought a number of things too, my favorites from his stash were The Dambuilders’ Tough Guy Problem ep and Beach House 7. TGP is just about ideal 90s quirky hard indie rock, the Beach House is note-perfect shoegaze, with great songs and a beautiful droney sound. I’d stack their album up against Loveless anytime. btw, we had Loveless along, too.
It’s important to note that my brother’s truck has very loud road noise. Some music had more trouble cutting through that noise than other. “Road Noise Resistance” is another of the judging criteria I’m using to quantify my experience of these records on the trip.
Welcome, Michael!
Gentle Giant — Acquiring the Taste(1971) I brought this one along to either dispell or confirm that this might be my favorite Gentle Giant album. I certainly didn’t dispell that notion. eight tracks, less than forty minutes. We probably listened to it beginning to end maybe 10 times, maybe more, so that will give you some idea.
Favorite tracks were “The House, The Street, The Room,” “Wreck,” and “Plain Truth.” “Pantagruel’s Nativity” also merits a mention. Quite honestly, I like the whole album. The big stylistic difference I see between how they’re playing here as opposed to how they play on later albums is that they used a bit more legato phrasing on this earlier opus. Gary Green’s guitar work shines on “The House…” I love the sea shanty flavor of “Wreck,” and “Plain Truth” just rocks.
I’ve been trying to sit with Octopus (their 4th album) and the staccato element of their later style is taking a little bit of getting used to. I understand that they styled themselves a funk band, and I do like their mid-period sound a whole lot, but right now, Aquiring the Taske just feels more like a rock album, and “rock album” is the flavor that hit the spot on our trip! Strong contender for favorite disc of the trip, and DEFINITELY my favorite GG.
Estimated Number of Listens: 20 Road Noise Resistance: 9/10 Perfect Album Scale: 10/10 Overall Score: 10/10
King Crimson — Discipline (1981) This is the other strong contender for best CD of the trip. I love how every note on this album feels like it exists in a spacific aesthetic framework, and yet at the same time feels so free and spontaneous. Nice trick! Maybe the one makes the other possible?
Every song is great — it’s a perfect album. I absolutely include the two instrumentals at the end. “Sheltering Sky” is simple and primal yet hits you like a beautiful psychedelic painting. Bill Bruford is the star of the track! “Frame by Frame” has been an earworm for me for the last 43 years, and the recording we played again and again this past week justifies that level of imprint on my delicate tissues. There was a lot of singing along with various Adrian Belew vocal lines (And a couple of Tony Levin ones, too.)
ENL: 18 RNR: 9/10 PAS: 10/10 OS: 10/10
Yes – Relayer (1874) Back in the day, I thought this album was built around too much “try.” I sensed that they had been shocked by the reception of Tales From Topographic Oceans (I think Tales is genius, btw, possibly their best work, so of COURSE it wasn’t appreciated at the time…) After sitting with this album through 5+ listens, I would have to say that I do still hear some “try” but goddamn, this album a triumph.
Alan White is no Bill Bruford. He is not a “touch” drummer the way Bruford is… but he is pretty fricken good. He played on Revolver, he played on both Plastic Ono Bands, I rest my case.
The point being, that I think of Yes in the same breath in which I think of the Beatles, Zep, Bowie, and Chairs Missing-era Wire, in other words, at the tippy tippy top of its genre, and also rock and roll in general. They were not afraid of dischord, and their sixth album does not shy away. There are also some transcendently lyrical moments here. Alternating between beautiful and aggressive, this is one of absolute favorite albums by this band.
The road noise really bordered on making it hard to listen to an album.
ENL: 8 RNR: 7/10 PAS: 9.5/10 OS: 9/10
Pink Floyd — Soundtrack From the Film “More” (1969) I was using the cat brush on the Persian rug next to the kid’s bed we acquired from one of our previous “living situations” and listening to this, and I really came to feel like it’s one of my favorite of their albums. Early Floyd is the best Floyd by far, in my opinion.
My actual favorite Pink Floyd is Saucerful of Secrets. Soundtrack from More is the album they recorded next, and feels like an important, intersticial album for the band. It’s not my second favorite, that would be Obscured By Clouds.
I love early Pink Floyd, but have long harbored the sentiment that they were a remarkable band up through Dark Side of The Moon, and that everything that came after it was total shite, and the worst of the lot has to be The Wall (which everyone else seems to love for some not-understood reason) but which is the absolute nadir of the ouvre in my jaundiced eye.
Cinema was a part of their feel as a band, and I think some of their best music was informed by it.
ENL: 7 RNR: 3/10 PAS: 8/10 OS:8/10
Genesis — Selling England by the Pound(1973) This was probably the least listened-to of the 5, but we listened to it 3 times in a row while driving through Lincoln, Nebraska, and I love it. Kinda wish we’d listened to it more. I think the problem is the amount of road noise we were having. Oneof the considerations when picking a CD to pop in was that it had to stand up to the background noise. One of the ratings I’m giving each of these for the trip is about how well it battled the steady, dissonant drone of road noise in that truck. I’m giving this one a 4 out of 10 for that. The sound of the truck blended too oddly with Tony Banks’s playing.
I love every track on this album. I think Genesis has 3 perfect albums, and this is one of them, absolutely.
Can anybody ‘splain to my why I LOVE Peter Gabriel’s voice in every context I’ve ever heard it in, and why Phil Collins’s singing is like fingernails on a chalkboard to me?
ENL: 4 RNR: 4/10 PAS: 10/10 OS: 7/10
I think, in the final analysis, what needs to be said is that I love all 5 of these albums. The order of preference in this blog post relates directly to how much enjoyment I got out of each one in the particular context of that trip from Pueblo, Colorado to Gill, Massachusetts. Each album was a color on our journey cross-country. I loved them all, and wish we’d listened to them each 100 times more.
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