KING CRIMSON – In The Court Of The Crimson King: King Crimson at 50

DGM 2022

To chase the wind of a prism ship and taste the sweet and sour, a documentary embarks on a trip into a well-kept secret.

In The Court Of The Crimson King:
King Crimson at 50

Although this ensemble is almost always perceived as an endless enigma – the mystery their mastermind Robert Fripp propagated and perpetuated for decades, sometimes letting the collective slip into a seeming oblivion only to continue to excite progressive rock connoisseurs and the uninitiated alike with his notion about the band being an impermanence-prone living organism, which allowed its musicians to assist the leader in the continuous change of familiar pieces to keep the music’s intrigue afloat – many an attempt have been made to find a full picture in such a puzzle. Here’s the last, and arguably ultimate, endeavor to look inside the heart of the hydra that carry on changing the number of heads sniping at any given time at those who approach it but never losing its bite that was destined to leave permanent marks on the listener’s psyche, the soul of the documentary’s director Toby Amies included.

The opening views of empty spaces and Fripp, seated alone on the stage with his guitar aiming to annihilate their silence via a soundwave, the soundscape, feel like a fitting metaphor for what’s about to – or supposed to – be detailed on-screen through the artist’s personal philosophy, the existential prospects Robert’s narrating behind the scenes. Still, when he says, at the beginning of the film, “There’s a lot of joy in what we do, and it’s also very difficult because what is possible for this band remains in potential, and we have not yet achieved it, and that’s an acute suffering,” one can rest assured: this enigma’s code will never get broken. Some hearts will, though – once Fripp and Ian McDonald quite emotionally admit the wrongness of their split, if not after humor and urgency as one of the group’s principal traits are outlined by the ailing Bill Rieflin, the embodiment of human vulnerability in the hard-veneered team of veterans, especially the now-late player’s personal friend, the hilariously grumpy, often histrionically cynical KC captain who, even at home, is besuited and surrounded by his ensemble’s emblems, while there’s but a few historical clips in the movie to marvel at.

Of course, the presence of former members – Adrian Belew, Bill Bruford, Michael Giles, Trey Gunn, the aforementioned McDonald who also passed away before the film was out, Jamie Muir and Pete Sinfield – all eloquent and quick with similes, may expand the perspective offered by the penultimate line-up wherein Mel Collins and Tony Levin provide particularly interesting angles because their intermittent stints in these ranks pinpoint different eras of the band’s lifespan. Yet in the end it just emphasizes that this documentary is not about the group’s route from the past to the present, and the “King Crimson at 50” subtitle should suggest the film’s main point: there’s a collective captured at a certain moment – the year of their jubilee – and aficionados have to rejoice at their idols’ longevity and resilience but reserve mental room for wonder anyway. Thus, for instance, Robert’s troupe hold an epiphany for Sister Dana Benedicta, a Norwegian nun and a prog fan, who sees the ensemble as a liturgical entity and an instrument of self-awareness, whereas her compatriots, fellow Fripp followers, laughingly characterize the octet as the Devil. So here’s the enigma as endless as hotels and venues corridors the musicians are roaming on-screen.

A lot of this roaming requires discipline that, apparently, hardly anyone other than Jakko Jakszyk is bold enough to pretend to rebel against, yet that’s the rulebook everybody has to adhere to. Robert might demand “a capacity to lead, a capacity to support, and a capacity to do nothing” from his colleagues, defining from the off a part he’s going to perform and expecting from the others an original solution to the “fit in” riddle. As a result, “the aim becomes being personally present” for the music to happen, and in the words of a long-time devotee, an American who had flown to Italy to admire the band in concert, it goes two ways, involving both the group and the audience, or, again according to Robert, three ways because music has a presence too. When this fragile balance, this moment is ruined due to a player or a listener’s ego, he states, a heartbreak ensues. And, as Rieflin elucidates further, to be present is “to exist as much as possible… in the here and now.”

And that’s what’s going on on the second disc of this package. Serving as a sort of dress rehearsal, with the collective arranged in an ellipse, the “Live In The Studio” segment permits a closer, than a live footage would, view of each of the musicians in radical action, to paraphrase the title of a KC suite that starts it; the portion whose funeral-home atmosphere renders “The Letters” extra-chilling and “Starless” extra-immersive, albeit never sterile. Less tight, the ensemble’s entire set from the already-seven-strong’s 2019 visit to Rio, their rare open-air outing, is rather short but it contains the righteously deranged run through “Red” with Jeremy Stacey going wild on the ivories, the mathematically precise “Indiscipline” where three drummers demonstrate staggering telepathy, and “The Court Of The Crimson King” and “21st Century Schizoid Man” with the ecstatic crowd singing the evergreen riffs.

This is the rapture which turns the KC’s mystery on its head: with such euphoria no questions are asked and no secrets are needed. If that’s the point of the film, its mission is accomplished in style.

*****

May 29, 2023

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