King Crimson - Red

[krabapple]

It gets my vote. The Mirrors section of Schizoid Man is the best jazz rock fusion I've ever heard, by far. I just wish they would have abbreviated the extended noodling/improv section of Moonchild.

Something about "I Talk to the Wind" just grates on me.

Even for prog, the lyrics for much of that album are risible.

That s/t UK album is fantastic.

Agreed. Back in '78 we all thought ('we' being my prog-loving high school crowd) thought that UK would be the savior of the genre, based on that album. Didn't quite turn out that way, did it? Anyway, all it needs now is some TLC in remastering -- the current CD is rather 'toppy' to my ears

[Dob]

Something about "I Talk to the Wind" just grates on me.

Even for prog, the lyrics for much of that album are risible.

The lyrics that bug me are the ones for the title cut. I've never cared for that sort of "dreamy/hallucinogenic/stream of consciousness" style. I remember seeing a "National Lampoon" songbook, years ago, that had a hilarious parody of that song.

At least "Epitaph" is straightforward...unlike the vast majority of Jon Anderson's inscrutable lyrics. Generally speaking, you know the lyricist is "going deep" when he chooses the word "purple":

"The purple piper plays his tune, the choir softly sing..."

"Shining, flying, purple wolfhound, show me where you are..."

"Tiny purple fishes run laughing through your fingers..."

[krabapple]

Well I saw the thing comin' out of the sky
It had the one long horn, one big eye.
I commenced to shakin' and I said "ooh-eee"
It looks like a purple people eater to me.

[Dob]

Another one that always comes to mind for me is "Voices Green and Purple" by the Bees.

It's funny how purple is associated with the weird and the strange.

[Crummy Old Label Avatar]

Yeah, well, choke on this idiotic-beyond-belief bit of "poetry":

"Prince Rupert Awakes"
from King Crimson's 1971 album Lizard

*******************************
Farewell the temple master's bells
His kiosk and his black worm seed
Courtship solely of his word
And Eden guaranteed.
For now Prince Rupert's tears of glass
Make saffron sabbath eyelids bleed
Scar the sacred tablet wax
On which the Lizards feed.

Wake your reasons' hollow vote
Wear your blizzard season coat
Burn a bridge and burn a boat
Stake a Lizard by the throat.

Go Polonius or kneel
The reapers name their harvest dawn
All your tarnished devil's spoons
Will rust beneath our corn.
Now bears Prince Rupert's garden roam
Across his rain tree shaded lawn
Lizard bones become the clay --
And there a Swan is born.

Wake your reasons' hollow vote
Wear your blizzard season coat
Burn a bridge and burn a boat

Stake a Lizard by the throat.

Gone soon Piepowder's moss-weed court
Round which upholstered Lizards sold
Visions to their leaden flock
Of rainbows' ends and gold.
Now tales Prince Rupert's peacock brings
Of walls and trumpets thousand fold
Prophets chained for burning masks
And reels of dreams unrolled...

_______________________________________________________


For now Prince Rupert's tears of glass/Make saffron sabbath eyelids bleed/Scar the sacred tablet wax/On which the Lizards feed Man, oh, man!

When do the dwarves come out to trod upon mini-Stonehenge?

Now do you want to see something truly breathtakingly NUTTY? Check THIS out:

http://www.songsouponsea.com/Promenade/ChapterOne.html

[Ess Ay Cee Dee]

nt

[dudelsack]

Wow. How much hash would I need to smoke to write something that awesome?

A ball the size of your fist. Ugh. For every moment of drug-addled brilliance in rock and roll there's about twenty side-long opuses that never should have been foisted on the world...

[Crummy Old Label Avatar]

You'd think that it is satire, huh? Who says that obsessive listening to rock music doesn't destroy your mind? This is proof to the contrary. Get a load of this:



Rupert the Bear can be seen in the letter 'N' on the album cover, flying an airplane.

"Crowley supports my view in The Wake World, where he writes of The Fool: "But really it is the man who meant to wake up, and did wake up. So that is his House, he is the old King himself, and so are you. So he wouldn't care what any one thought he was."

- Tarot Inspiration: The Fool

In Latin:
rue - destroy; ruin; overthrow; fall; be ruined.
per - through; during; by means of.

So the name Rupert could be said to mean "destroy by means of".

http://www.songsouponsea.com/Promenade/wilderness.html

[krabapple]

Yeah, well, choke on this idiotic-beyond-belief bit of "poetry":

"Prince Rupert Awakes"
from King Crimson's 1971 album Lizard

Now imagine it sung by Jon Anderson -- he's the guest vocalist on that track. I'm sure for some of you that's too much information. Also, the 'Lizard' cover (from which that image is taken) also has the Beatles on it down in another letter. 'Happy Family' (sung by Gordon Haskell, which is not good) is a thinly disguised song about them.


Me, I've always found this particular line from 'In the Court of the Crimson King' to be teetch-gratingly twatty, even by prog rock standards --


The pattern juggler lifts his hand;
The orchestra begin.


It's that preciously grammatical use of the singular 'orchestra' that gets me.

[Patrick M]

Just curious if any of you guys are into modern prog metal stuff? If so, you must be familiar with Spock's Beard - Snow, the fascinating two CD concept album about an albino.

http://tinyurl.com/4uool

[Crummy Old Label Avatar]

Here's another Sinfield corker, this one from Islands. It's quite dramatic, so please don't get too emotional....

[BTW, Sinfield struck financial gold in the 1980s by writing lyrics for CHER]

The Letters

With quill and silver knife
She carved a poison pen
Wrote to her lover's wife:
"Your husband's seed has fed my flesh."

As if a leper's face
That tainted letter graced
The wife with choke-stone throat
Ran to the day with tear blind eyes.

Impaled on nails of ice
And raked with emerald fire
The wife with soul of snow
With steady hands begins to write.

"I'm still, I need no life
To serve on boys and men
What's mine was yours is dead
I take my leave of mortal flesh"

[Ess Ay Cee Dee]

nt

[Dob]

If you guys want a refreshing change of pace from all these "English Lit major" lyrics, try "Pre-med" lyrics.

[Ess Ay Cee Dee]

nt

[krabapple]

That's heavy, man.

It's hard to believe that a pretentious twat like Sinfield did such a thoroughly decent job of producing the first Roxy Music LP.

Why? Do you imagine that producers aren't often *pretentious*?