SOUNDTRACK: KING CRIMSON-The Elements Of King Crimson – 2015 Tour Box (2015).
The Elements box set has become a tour staple since the band reformed in 2014. This is the second set and it contains another fascinating cross section of music from throughout Crimson’s existence.
In addition to the music, these sets contain a booklet that is chock full of pictures and usually an essay that gives context to what you’re about to hear.
It also includes the seven Principles of King Crimson
- May King Crimson bring joy to us all. Including me.
- If you don’t want to play a part, that’s fine!
- Give it to someone else – there’s enough of us.All the music is new, whenever it was written.
- If you don’t know your note, hit C#.
- If you don’t the time, play in 5. Or 7.
- If you don’t know what to play, get more gear.
- If you still don’t know what to play, play nothing.
Of the four boxes, I think this is my favorite–although the second disc of 2017 is pretty awesome. I really enjoy the first half of the first disc. It’s all instrumental (even tracks that have words are instrumental versions). It’s a great collection of sometimes pretty, sometimes not, 70s prog rock.
The eight-minute instrumental version of “Epitaph” (Steven Wilson 2015 instrumental mix) is gorgeous. Even though I like the words just fine, there’s something really thrilling about removing them on this song. “Catfood” is (somewhat obviously) a rather goofy lyric, so hearing this complex song without words is also a treat. “Bolero – The Peacock’s Tale” is listed as a Tony Levin overdub. I don’t know exactly what that means, as it is taken from the Lizard recording sessions, but the song is lovely.
In addition to longer, complete songs, the Elements sets feature short snippets. Like the two-minute extract of “Islands” (with oboe). Or the four-minute jazzy “A Peacemaking Stint Unrolls” which is clearly the foundation for “Lark’s Tongues in Aspic.”
Although the set is largely chronological, there’s an excerpt from the 2014 tour rehearsals in which Fripp discusses how the band knows all of their parts. They give a mellow example of how he and Jakko will play “Larks’ Tongues in Aspic (Part II)” which is followed by the full 6 minute version from 1974. It’s followed by an 11 minute live version of “Fracture” from 1974 (the previous box’s version was from 1973).
There’s a “guitar extract” of “One More Red Nightmare” (less than a minute long) from 1974 followed by a full performance of the song from 2014 which doesn’t feel like a jump of forty years in any way.
The disc jumps to the 1980s era with an extended remix of “Elephant Talk” followed by 1981’s “Absent Lovers.”
1983’s “Larks’ Tongues in Aspic Part III/Sleepless” is staggeringly good.
Disc Two suffers a bit in comparison, which I find surprising as I really like the later era of King Crimson–the more metal sounding stuff is really intense.
I enjoyed the first part–the late 1990s; work. “Jurassic THRAK” sounds huge, and 2014’s drum solo “The Hell Hounds of Krim” works fine as a connector to the next four songs which highlight the late 90’s abrasive guitars. It’s about 20 minutes of noisy coolness. “VROOOM,” “Coda: Marine 475” and “ProjeKction” (Performed by ProjeKct Four) all showcase that complicated music really delightfully.
Then things start to slow down somewhat. “Larks’ Tongues in Aspic – Part IV/the construKction of light” suffers in my mind because of the smallness of the band. With only four members playing, the song doesn’t feel like a huge organism, it feels more like two guitarists playing next to each other. Mind you, it sounds amazing if you can get away from the fact that it doesn’t feel terribly “full.” Of course, I may be just spoiled from the great versions of LTIA I’ve seen with the 7-piece band.
Things really slow down and chill out for “Sus-Tayn-Z” (Performed by ProjeKct X), “Power to Believe,” “Ex Uno Patres” and the nine minute exceedingly mellow (with vocals) “The Light of Day.” I do not love this style of Crimson. It works as a palette cleanser between heavy songs, but too much is too much.
The “Ba Ba Boom Boom” drum solo and “ATTAKcATHRAK” ramp things up with the kind of noise that segues nicely into the blistering 2014 version of “21st Century Schizoid Man.”
This box set once again demonstrates that King Crimson is a multi-headed beast, liable to go in any direction at any time.
[READ: January 6, 2018] Heroes of the Frontier
Somehow I missed that Eggers had written this book. I saw it in the bookstore recently and immediately grabbed it and devoured it.
I was worried that it was going to be a woman-moves-off-the-grid-and-life-gets-better story, but it’s not that at all. It’s far more complicated and a bit more unsettling.
Josie is a dentist in Ohio. But as we meet her, she and her children are riding in a crappy rented RV through the highways of Alaska.
Josie has a large sum of cash with her. She had been sued by a patient for a sum she could not afford. Rather than trying to raise th e money to save her practice or giving it over to woman, she sold her practice in total to a dentist friend. So now, she has the cash and, temporarily, no future.
She was also in a terrible relationship. Her children’s father, Carl, had taken off on them. He was always aloof and a loser, but this disappearance to Florida was something else entirely.
She took her kids, Paul (8) and Ana (5) and got outta Dodge. The children are an interesting pair. Paul is nurturing and worrying, especially about his sister. He looks after her more closely than their mother ever does. Ana, meanwhile, is a disaster–she seems to have a natural gift for how to break something–she can find the weak point of any structure or situation and cause havoc wherever she goes–and Paul is happy to fix the situation.
Why Alaska? Because she has a stepsister (sort of) who lives in Homer. Sam is independent and successful (which Josie was as well, although she was unhappy).
Josie wrote to Sam and said she was coming. They hadn’t seen each other in five years and Sam wrote “fine.” which Josie took as a good sign. The three of them flew to Alaska, met Stan, the man who rented them their RV, and then headed off. They were to come back in three weeks.
They couldn’t arrive in Homer for three more days because Sam was out of town. So they drove around Alaska looking for things to do. Anchorage proved to be a huge disappointment–expensive, conservative and depressing. She didn’t need to see another “I voted for the American” bumper sticker, that was for sure.
Her first disappointment was to discover that you can’t park on the side of the road, even in Alaska, overnight. The State Trooper woke her at 2AM to get her to go to the RV Park up the road. And so the story involves them driving from RV Park to RV Park, meeting locals, meeting travelers. Some of the incidents are quite funny. One episode was published in The New Yorker and was about a very funny cruise ship magic show
As each day passes Josie feels more and more like an outlaw. She didn’t tell anyone she was leaving. She is sure that Carl is after her. She is convinced he is tailing her. And she is haunted by her past. There was a boy who was her patient–he was a sharp, intelligent kid and he babysat for her from time to time. He wanted nothing more than to make a difference in the world and she encouraged him. But that decision proved to be deadly for him. And she felt that his parents blamed her–and they probably did.
Not to mention, the Chateau that they are driving is old and, while cared for, certainly no longer top of the line. Josie is not even entirely sure how to drive it properly–it takes some days to get used to. There are several amusing (or not) incidents with the vehicle. Like the fact that the vehicle can’t go over 48 even on a 65 highway. Or when Ana turned on the gas to the stove, not realizing she almost killed them all. Or when she turned on the tank heater–the heater designed to keep the toilet from freezing–only it wasn’t cold out so it just cooked what was in the toilet.
About a quarter of the way into the book they make it to Homer and her stepsister’s place. It’s pretty impressive. Sam gives tours of the wilderness to foreigners and has clearly done pretty well for herself. She also has two healthy, robust and super friendly teenage girls (and her kids immediately love them).
No story of a woman escaping her past can exist without the past, and Josie’s past is pretty fascinating. Her parents were nurses at a VA hospital. They were strict and stern, but apparently the hospital wasn’t. An there were soon all kinds of problems reported–poor drug dispensing, over and under prescribing, accidental deaths. Her parents weren’t directly guilty, but they couldn’t avoid the brush of guilt. And soon they began doing the drugs they prescribed.
Josie was traumatized by her parents and sought refuge in her dentist, Sunny. Sunny was kind and thoughtful and while Josie was having a hard time, Sunny allowed her to hang out in the dentist office. She became like a mother to Josie. This bond seemed to strengthen them both. So much so that Josie learned Sunny had more or less taken in another girl. The details of this section are really good.
Josie and Sam have always had a weird relationship. And Josie has always been defensive around her. When they get to Homer, Josie feels judged immediately. First for apparently eating all of the food and then for apparently buying the wrong kind to replace it. And everything costs so much in Alaska, for crying out loud.
To make it better, Sam takes Josie out drinking and dancing. Josie finds it so traumatic for various wonderful and horrible reasons, that she decides to leave Homer the next day without telling Sam.
The book is set with the backdrop of the Alaska wildfires of 2015, a fire that burned over 5 million acres of and. They are vaguely aware of the fires–hearing and seeing vehicles en route from one place to another. They are eventually rerouted because they are driving too close to the fires (that surreal scene of the driving alone on the highway is wonderfully apocalyptic). They are even assisted by people she assumes are firefighters when they get a fat tire–they are not firefighters and their supervisor is pleased to see them men working together so nicely.
She also meets several people who are like (which she hates to admit)–people who are running away from something or trying to remain free of the State–things she is doing but which she can’t admit.
But she also meets people who are not very nice. Like the man who chases them away from a bed and breakfast (and Josie is sure has climbed onto their RV while they were fleeing). Or the man in the diner who she believes is serving her papers. This scene was very confusing to me as there is literally no way it could have been that because no one knew where she was.
Some happier moments involve accidentally encountering a wedding at an RV park, meeting a man who is quite kind (although that goes awkwardly sour) and finally, finding a cabin that they can call home for a bit.
The end of the story sees them inadvertently getting evacuated because of the fire.
As with many stories like this, I found the end to be disappointing. Basically it ends a lot sooner than it should–we re left with a likely direction for the future but there are so many loose ends, that it’s the kind of ending that you feel satisfied about when you turn the last page, but as soon as you think back and realize that tall of the threads are unanswered you are kind of bummed.
But as with most of Eggers’ books, the story itself is great. His writing is consistently enjoyable.
I Just Read About That... 
Leave a comment