Maybe you’ve heard of King Crimson. As far as progressive rock bands go, they never had the commercial success of Pink Floyd or were as prolific as Yes. Various lineups of the band existed throughout the early 70s and make some headway in the crowded prog-rock market, but when they regrouped in 1981, it was essentially a different band.
Indeed, you could argue it’s less a band and more a project for Robert Fripp’s idiosyncratic musical vision: tricky rhythms, jagged bursts of guitar and genre-pushing music. At their best, King Crimson’s music is propulsive and complex, rock with an ear for bombast and rhythm, but not one straying too far into the obtuse. Something like post-punk played by musicians with serious chops with an eye for jazz and the absurd.
The third incarnation of the band is extensively featured in the new box On (and Off) the Road, a deep dive into King Crimson c. 1981-1984. There are 19 discs on the set: three studio albums (1981’s Discipline, 1982’s Beat and 1984’s Three of a Perfect Pair), two discs of studio outtakes and hours of concerts. The albums are presented on CD, DVD-A with 5.1 surround sound and on blu-ray in high resolution sound.
Each of the three albums have aged well and show Fripp and company treading an interesting musical path. You can hear traces of the tense and bombastic 70s King Crimson at times, but the skittering beats and nervous edges show he’d kept his ears on a new wave of bands: Talking Heads and DEVO immediately come to mind. The emphasis on percussion also suggests he’d been listening to the stuff coming out of Africa, especially acts like Fela Kuti. Of the three, I’m bullish on Discipline, but really, all three albums set a high standard. The new mixes are nice, although I haven’t A/Bed them to the original ones. Full disclosure: my review copy was lacking the DVD/Blu discs, so I can’t comment on the surround sound/lossless mixes or the alternate material included therein.
However, they were a different beast on stage, which makes the live material key to this set’s appeal. It’s also the bulk of this set’s contents, literally taking you from start and finish: their first gig, a club gig in April 1981, and their final show in Montreal a little over three years later. It’s a little of everything: grainy lo-fi audience tapes and multi-tracked professional jobs.
This lineup’s first gig came in Bath at a club called Moles. The audience-sourced tape’s a little dodgy (it sounds narrow, but works nicely on headphones), but the band shines through. They hadn’t been together long, but twist and turn through most of Discipline, plus a couple of older Crimson songs: “Red” and “Lark’s Tongue in Aspic Part II.” Still, then-new songs like “Discipline” build into compelling grooves and complex playing; “Elephant Talk” has singer/guitarist Adrian Belew slashing, moaning and yelping, both vocally and on his guitar.
A few months later, the band rolled into Japan and their Dec. 18th gig is included here, also from an audience tape. A steady amount of touring had honed the band’s chops and already Fripp was working in numbers from the yet-to-be-released Beat: “Neurotica,” “Neil and Jack and Me.” The playing’s on point, although with a sharper edge: “Thela Hun Ginjeet” builds up to a nerve-wrecking crescendo, while Belew’s guitar on “Elephant Talk” rings and screams. The tape itself has a great sense of ambience: well enough recorded you get a sense of how the audience heard things and lacking the sterile sound of soundboard tapes.
The next summer’s tour also has two dedicated discs: one from a show in Frejus, France on Aug. 27, 1982, and another from Munich, Germany about a month later. Both shows have the band expanding their setlists from the year before, effortlessly working in new material and refining their sound. “Waiting Man” slowly builds up from drums to include each member of the band into a “Bolero”-like groove. Meanwhile, “Heartbeat” almost sounds like their attempt at a pop single, a mid-tempo rocker with Belew singing about a lost love (the video’s easily the most dated aspect of this era). It’s certainly one of the most straight-ahead songs this lineup premiered. Both of them are essential listens for fans.
Lastly, the double-CD set Absent Lovers documents their 1984 tour. An electrifying set from Montreal, it has a nice selection from their three LPs and a couple of audience favourites. Newer stuff like “Larks Tongue in Aspic Part III” has a driving, almost industrial edge to it, suggesting where Fripp would head on albums like THRAK nearly a decade later. Meanwhile, years of playing songs like ”Thela Hun Ginjeet” meant they could rip through them at light speed – at the expense of Belew’s improvised monologue.
Finally, there’s two discs of studio oddities. Are You Recording, Gary opens with a long, raw recording, an inside look at them working material out in the studio. Between the bits of chatter and joking, the song builds up into a tense, ominous groove. Meanwhile three “redux” tracks are essentially abridged and alternate versions of this lineup’s three albums: “Discipline Redux” brings out more of Fripp’s guitar, for example.
Meanwhile, Fragmented represents an abandoned album from early 1983. Like it’s title suggests, it’s a disjointed listen, a bunch of tracks which don’t really mesh together. In sum, it’s like an even more experimental version of Three of a Perfect Pair’s second half. There are more than a few moments of interest – the moody “Steinberger Melody” and the slow groove of “Grace Jones” come to mind – but it’s largely a sequence of material suggesting things weren’t quite clicking. Still it’s interesting to compare to them live: unlike some bands, they worked out their song’s kinks in private and appeared as a well-oiled machine in public.
All in all, On and Off the Road has literally everything a King Crimson fan could want from a set devoted to this era of the band. Which raises an interesting conundrum: if someone is a big enough fan to want all of this, wouldn’t they already own a bunch of it? I’m not talking about the three studio albums, either. Both the Munich and Bath shows were previously available from their mail-order Collectors Club, the Montreal show is available as an official live album and the Frejus show is available on DVD (as The Noise – Live in Frejus). Wouldn’t hardcore fans have all of those already?
Maybe, maybe not. While there’s quite a bit of Crimson stuff out there – including several shows featuring this lineup that aren’t included here – several of them are out of print. And the dizzying array of bonus features and alternate mixes, outtakes and rough drafts border on overkill; only the Grateful Dead seem to go to a similar length to give fans as much as possible and even there, they don’t include posters, photos and all the other little goodies (disclosure again: not included on my review copy).
Hardcore fans will love this; even casual fans will dig some of material this set drags from the darker corners: the live sets from Frijus and Montreal are perhaps more exciting than their studio records and easily purchased online. All in all, On and Off the Road might be the year’s best archival box set.