Welcome to another edition of From My Collection. This week, Jamie Muir, former percussionist for King Crimson, passed away at the age of 82. Muir led an enigmatic life, filled with almost as much mystique as the music he helped create. After his 1973 departure from King Crimson, he became a Buddhist monk. He’d return to the music scene in 1980, making guest appearances on various albums, before retiring from music for good in 1990. He’d spend the last 35 years of his life painting. No doubt about it, Muir is one of the most unique figures that a metal outlet could cover. Furthermore, his sole outing with Crimson isn’t “metal” in the traditional sense of the term (especially for the era), but proved to be crucial to an entire crop of bands to follow come the ’80s and ’90s. This is the story of King Crimson’s fifth album, Larks’ Tongues in Aspic.
For those who tend not to associate King Crimson within the realm of heavy metal, allow me to set the stage. The band formed in 1969, evolving out of an oddball trio named Giles, Giles and Fripp. Out of that trio, the younger Giles brother, drummer Michael, and guitarist Robert Fripp would unite with bassist/singer Greg Lake, multi-instrumentalist Ian MacDonald, and lyricist Peter Sinfield to form the original incarnation of King Crimson. The band’s moniker itself was a synonym for Satan. And you thought they had no metal cred…ha!
Their first album, 1969’s In the Court of the Crimson King, set the standard for the progressive rock boom that followed in the ’70s. Sure, symphonically tinged albums like The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967) and The Moody Blues’ Days of Future Passed (1967) can be seen as forerunners, but it was Crimson King that established progressive rock as a proper genre, paving the way for a decade’s worth of post-Beatles exploration that would push the established boundaries and norms of rock music to new heights.
As King Crimson continued to mutate in terms of personnel, so did their music. With each subsequent album, Crimson King started to sound and feel like a relic of the distant past. Save for Fripp, the sole constant member of the band from day one, nobody knew what they were going to get from a Crimson album. And nobody in a million years could’ve anticipated the sound that would come from their stereo on March 23rd, 1973, when King Crimson re-emerged with a brand new lineup and their long awaited fifth album, Larks’ Tongues in Aspic.
After the release of 1971’s Islands, Fripp parted ways with the then entire King Crimson lineup, stating that they were “musically incompatible” with his new vision. What did that vision entail? Nobody knew save for Fripp himself, who spent the duration of 1972 assembling a brand new lineup. First to join was bassist/vocalist John Wetton, formally of English freak rockers Family. Next up, Jamie Muir: An improvisational percussionist who’d compliment Fripp’s new-found fascination with the avant-garde. On the drums entered Bill Bruford, who’d held down the beat for one of prog’s first bona-fide arena rock sensations, Yes. Rounding out the fold, multi-instrumentalist David Cross. Little did this quintet know they’d craft the band’s most daring, intense, and extreme outing to date.
When Larks’ Tongues hit record store shelves in ’73, there was truly nothing like it. At the time, progressive rock existed in its own world, each band priding themselves on ambitious suites with virtuosic musicianship and impeccable atmosphere. Metal too, still in its infancy, stood alone, highlighting brute force and sonic intensity above all else. Yet here came an album that fused both musical ideas, coupled with the unpredictability of free jazz and an anything goes attitude. It wasn’t progressive rock, but it wasn’t heavy metal either. Is Larks’ Tongues truly the birth of progressive metal, pre-Rush? The argument stands to be made.
Larks’ Tongues opens with a nearly 14 minute freak-out in the form of Part 1 of its title track. After an opening few minutes of airy chimes, a disjointed melody, and other assorted noises, we’re greeted by the dramatic violin of Cross and Fripp’s gargantuan guitar riffage, now sounding heavier than ever in this post-Iommi age. It’s as if the fuzzed out meanderings of “21st Century Schizoid Man” just a few years earlier were a mere warmup for this here exercise in brutality, fusing spine-snapping riffs, free jazz soloing, unpredictable tempo changes, and a barrage of noise to create the musical equivalent of an anxiety attack.
A trippy, delicate piece entitled “Book of Saturday” follows, serving as a rightful palette cleanse. Showcasing Wetton’s angelic vocals and the gentle side of Fripp’s guitar stylings, it’s almost as if the band is toying with our emotions. How can a band go from the most intense of musical extremes one second, only to lay down something so sweet and innocent right after? Like a later song in their catalog would proclaim, King Crimson were indeed the great deceivers, just like Satan himself, fooling us one song at a time. If rock n’ roll went right, you could count on Fripp and company to make a sharp left.
Much to everyone’s shock, “Exiles” closes side A by expanding upon the tender leanings of “Book of Saturday”. It almost feels like a nod to the band’s Crimson King era, with its symphonic prog ambitions. It also proved just how crucial Fripp was to keeping the Crimson machine going. Although he was the only member of that ’69 lineup present, he could still craft an impassioned symphonic prog suite that stood toe to toe with “In the Court of the Crimson King” or “Epitaph”. Surely, the listening public would be safe as they turned to side B, right? Wrong…
“Easy Money” kicks off the latter half of this platter in truly disorienting fashion. After walloping us with an array of dissonant hard rock riffs, the verses cling to each other by a thread, again, coming off as disjointed and unhinged on purpose. Fripp solos like only he could, bridging the gap between traditional rock and the avant-garde, while Cross lays down a hypnotic mellotron soundscape and Bruford holds down the beat. Muir makes assorted sounds on top, as does Wetton, whose dreamy vocals add a surreal edge to the madness.
For the duration of the album, Wetton’s vocals retreat and the instruments do the talking. On the aptly titled “The Talking Drum”, Bruford and Muir unite to create an otherworldly drum symphony, laying down tribal rhythms against a thumping bass riff, uneasy violin lines, and a melodically intimidating guitar solo, courtesy of Fripp. One might draw some similarities to the raga rockers of the ’60s, structurally speaking, but like every song on here, “The Talking Drum” is its own beast. Whereas other rock bands used instrumentals as a form of musical filler, for King Crimson, these showpieces were as pivotal and had as much to say as the songs with words.
Closing it all out is Part 2 of the title track, on which Crimson goes full avant-garde metal galore. Fripp has credited the influence of Jimi Hendrix as being responsible for the “hard rock” direction of Crimson circa ’73-’74, but I can’t help but think the stylings of Iommi and Blackmore must’ve made their way into the maverick guitarist’s psyche as well around this time. There’s a sharpness and heft to “Larks’ Tongues in Aspic (Part 2)” that’s simply undeniable. It is, in the context of 1973, metallic, albeit in the most unorthodox manner. Although it is slightly more “structured” than its predecessor, it is nevertheless chaotic and nerve-racking, daring those of a weak disposition to cower in mortal fear.
Although seldom mentioned in metal circles today (hopefully this helps change that), Larks’ Tongues in Aspic is as crucial an album to the genre’s development as Paranoid, In Rock, or Sad Wings of Destiny. Without it, there is no Voivod, no Gorguts, no Celtic Frost, no Opeth. Any forward-thinking, outside the box, bizarro-metal that we take for granted today can be traced back to this here album, and those that followed (1974’s Starless and Bible Black and Red). I’m sure Master Fripp himself would shudder reading this very paragraph, knowing that such an esteemed maestro as he could be responsible for inspiring such racket. Well Mr. Fripp, indeed you are, and the world is a better place for it. Rest in power Jamie Muir, and all hail the Crimson King.
The Musical equivalent of an anxiety attack!
Perfectly captures this masterpiece.