50 years later this song remains a provocation, a revelation, a dare, maybe a double dare and, like a few other masterpieces of modernist music, deeply moving in the parts that resolve to moments of more traditional beauty.
For me this is, always has been, and always will be the "National Anthem" of the mighty kingdom ruled by the Crimson King. It's for me like the point where all the lines, all the different incarnations, different styles come together. That rising line with which it opens and closes is just the band's signature.
I think that John Wetton had an uncanny ability to recognize if something is average or top notch. He was not just a singing bass player but a profound musician who understood more than most people would expect.
He was a brilliant musician. He’s badly missed. His singing made some of King Crimson’s best music hauntingly beautiful and profound. I had the good fortune to see the band in his earliest years, touring Lark’s Tongues in Aspic and Starless. His singing cuts to the heart.
I was in college in the late eighties, and listening to some Peter Gabriel (I think it was) with some friends, and made the offhand comment, "Tony Levin is such an amazing bassist - can you imagine if he were in a band with Bill Bruford?" (Whom we had all admired from his work with Yes.) At which point my friends said, "There IS such a band!" and put on Discipline. It was both astounding and completely different from what I was expecting. And my first conscious introduction to both Fripp and Belew.
I attended this show- it was on my birthday- and it's in my top 5 all time favorite shows. I especially remembered this number as I had only recently purchased the studio album "Red," and was eager to see ANY of that material performed live. You guys were just flat-out fantastic. I've recently turned my 15-yr old son to "Discipline," and he is firmly hooked. Which is a fine thing.
I was also at this show, they were awesome as expected. I even liked the Thrak album they were touring, thought it could have gotten a little more love. This version of Red slays!
I bought the Red Album exactly in my 20th birthday in 1974 fresh from the presses and it became one of my old time Crimson favorites to this day as a 69 year old decrepit dude😂Peace!
Red, what a great tune and what an amazing album! A perfect swansong for that '74 version of the band. Not sure how many copies I've bought over the years for friends and family, but each copy was totally worth it. This KC double trio really lays into it and does it justice. Belew, as always, tweaks the proceedings up a notch.
The double trio was an excellent incarnation of KC. I wasn’t sure about the two drummer configuration at first, but Bill and Pat really figured out great ways to play off of each other. And Trey was another stellar addition to the band.
Good heavens 👍 This is fantastic. I bought three tickets to the Wiltern Theater show on this tour. My drummer and bassist were outstanding professional musicians, so they couldn't afford to go. I fixed that with a credit card. The opening act, California Guitar Trio, floored us. Then, the Krim cleaned the floor.
I think "heavy" is a good description, but also 'typically masterful' by king Crimson's virtuosos. My first time hearing King Crimson was an all-nighter with its first album, alternating with Mahavishnu Orchestra. I heard them both for the first time in 1971, back to back, over and over all night long. By the morning, 'I'd got it'. I think King Crimson should be ranked near to very top of 'progressive rock'- which is really an inadequate term for it. I first came to know the name Bill Bruford, from the many records I listened to. I kept seeing this name over and over. What a career!
I enjoyed reading your stories of Red. I consider Red to be heavy-ish but have always loved it. Glad ya'll kept it on the album. I love your description of this version of Red being "dinner-jacket heavy". Beautiful. Thank you.
I got to see KC in Texas on their final tour a few years ago, the Covid tour. I took my band to the show and they sort of knew about Crimson. They opened with Pictures of a City and my drummer was glued to his seat, wide eyed and blown away. They had 3 drummers in front of the stage, the rest played on the stacks of speakers. I lost my mind when they played One more Red Nightmare and then later Red. Adrian Belew was not there but Mel Collins, the original KC sax player was and also Jakko, Tony and Pat. GREAT SHOW! Just Wow.
Heaviness comes from the emotional weight of the music, not from how loud it is. With certain songs like Starless, it might be hard to get back on your feet when the song ends. Most metal bands in the 80s got it all wrong but not Sabbath.
I'm a latecomer to KC, my first show was on the 'Beat' tour (July '83) with Fripp/Belew/Bruford/Levin, and that lineup will always have a special place in my heart. Seeing all four of you in this clip warms my heart!
My brother that's Not Late😂! I saw them just a year before in Ann Arbor MI and low and behold twas only 13 yrs after conception and Now Wow, 42 years have gone by. So not late, just intime 😆😎✌️
I'm a big fan of the Discipline Crew and the Double Trio doing earlier Crimson works such as this; shame that it was an uncommon occurrence for them to be performed but nonetheless, thank you in advance for this one
after purchasing the Longplay and after just a few notes of the opener, I knew not just KC but music had stepped into another area. And everything sounded like Swan Song, too.
I was also at this show. It all went well until Adrian pulled out the drill for Thrakk. My then new girlfriend almost got up and walked out because she'd had a crap day at work, REALLY wanted a glass of wine but was denied by Robert's no alcohol mandate, and her back was killing her in the less than comfortable Warfield seats. We're still together but it was a very close call. After that we made a deal that I would never ask her to accompany me to a King Crimson concert!
I saw this iteration of KC in 1995 at the Auditorium Theater in Rochester NY (where Tony Levin and Steve Gadd lived when attending the Eastman School of Music!) Great show. I recall an old metalhead suddenly jumping up when Red was played and walking up and down the aisle - banging his head - because he just couldn't stay sitting. I *think* this is also the show where Robert suddenly stood up from his stool for just a minute or two - while playing. One would have thought that he did a backward flip through a burning hop onto a trampoline = the crowd went wild when eh stood up!
John Wetton is my favorite bass player in the band but I've always loved Tony Levin. I found out about him on the ABWH album & tour then learned in retrospect he was on lots of Gabriel stuff, Pink Floyd's '87 album and Late in the Evening by Paul Simon (amongst many other stuff).
Paul Simon had a smoking band around the time of One Trick Pony. Levin on bass, Richard Tee on keys, Steve Gadd on drums and Eric Gale on guitar (basically the band Stuff minus 2). If you've never seen Stuff Live at Montreux 1976 you should check it out. Cheers
Hola. Un tema de la época en la cual Bill había dejado Yes y pasó a integrar una de las mejores etapas de King Crimson. En este video recreado magistralmente, con el Crimson que volvió en los 80' y se transformó en los 90" en el doble trío. Gracias Bill. Saludos desde ciudad de Canelones, Uruguay.
You still can't beat a dose of 70s Crim played by 90s Crim. Bruford never broke a stick in Crim. Impressive dynamic control that. Says a lot that John Wetton backed Fripp on Red's inclusion. He was right. And Wetton often seemed the most keen to keep Crim moving in the direction of towering, lumbering success.
I don’t know a drummer who couldn’t learn an important lesson from Bill Bruford. His metronomic, ‘as-written’ playing makes polyrhythm a reality on stage. Too many let the thrill drive their playing onstage and it drives the ensemble possiblities right off the rails. Bruford is not immune to this but he is an exception to the rule and I can’t get enough of it.
A great rendition of my favorite pieces of all time. You are too humble. Heavy is not, as you point out, about sweating biceps or whatever. The truth is hundreds of metal bands have sold their souls to try to achieve this level of brutality, and completely failed. The reason is that they forgot music has to be beautiful as well. Your performance on the original album version of this song is one of the greatest drum performances I know of. thank you for posting this!
I leard that it has now been given to the guys in the Beat lineup, though it is quite a different shape to Denis Carey's usual setup. I saw it recently, on sale at Graham Russell Drums in Fareham, Hampshire, England, when they hosted an auction sale of all Bill's performing gear on his retirement.
Well, it only took 3 guitarists and 2 drummers to recreate that enormous energy of the original version on the album 🙃 .. just proves some things cant be bettered.. never in the same river twice
So, I never heard any KC music before about three years ago. Thankfully, I now have the best-sounding stereo system I've ever heard and am finding out about a lot of bands I knew nothing about. Making up for wasted time!
I was always a little ambivalent about the double trio years in the same way I was about the Yes:Union situation. Apples and oranges of course but I felt like it became too busy and confusing a stage show to fully digest. I became a Crimson fan in the early 80's and saw the NYC show that was outdoors by the aircraft carrier museum which I think had to be the Three of a Perfect Pair tour. I was in high school at the time but it was so exciting to see how this music was played by just 4 guys. And so all those years later on the Thrak tour I was happy that Crimson were back together but I was almost 30 by then and somehow it just didn't move me like it did when I was a teenager. The live show that is. I enjoyed the Thrak album though.
To be honest, Mr. Bruford, I *still* haven't warmed to this song's original studio recording. No matter how many times I listen to it, I always find myself mentally nodding off well before the end. It's a decent tune, but I find it hard to understand why Rolling Stone put it in their Top 100 Guitar Songs - although the fact that that list also includes songs like "Born to Run" by Bruce Springsteen, where guitar is conspicuous only by its near-absence, suggests to me that in many cases they didn't really listen to the song, just took an artist who was known for having a good guitarist and selected one of their better-known songs. To close this post on a positive note, I'd say this rendition of "Red" solidly beats the studio version, having much more energy and dynamics.
interesting final paragraph...I watched some Billy Joel concert highlights on TV many years ago.Devitto was hitting his cymbals so hard that they made NO SOUND...you could see him pummeling them...see them moving...but producing ZERO sound...
I love this song and this performance, but man, there's something about it that's almost demonic. I was imagining how Red could work as a theme song for the opening of a totalitarian political party convention, with all the attendees marching in time to the driving rhythm, and during some of the quieter passages performing individual interpretive dances that reflect martial themes with slashing, stomping and bayoneting motions. No idea what Robert Fripp was actually trying to convey with this composition, but it can have a rather unsettling effect, and the album in its entirety has an air of melancholy and foreboding. Perhaps working through such reactions is part of the thrill of powerful music.
I loved Bill's quote on leaving Yes to join King Crimson: it was like jumping over the Berlin Wall, INTO East Germany...
If you know both sides of that wall and YES and K.C. as well, you know how right this quote is...
@@sugrojYes was an "endless debate", like a democracy, but King Crimson was like... less democratic, more experimental and stuff
Not gonna lie. I always love to imagine K.C. as K.C. and The Sunshine Band instead 😄
I still like Yes better, even Rush.
@@DrMidnight-oz1rkbleh. I like rush a lot but king crimson is objectively better than yes
50 years later this song remains a provocation, a revelation, a dare, maybe a double dare and, like a few other masterpieces of modernist music, deeply moving in the parts that resolve to moments of more traditional beauty.
It's an overly repetitive riff driven, metal voyage.
For me this is, always has been, and always will be the "National Anthem" of the mighty kingdom ruled by the Crimson King. It's for me like the point where all the lines, all the different incarnations, different styles come together. That rising line with which it opens and closes is just the band's signature.
I think that John Wetton had an uncanny ability to recognize if something is average or top notch. He was not just a singing bass player but a profound musician who understood more than most people would expect.
Fripp said in an interview that he believes John was as good as Jaco Pastorius. It's somewhere on RUclips, sorry I don't have a link
Looks like Tony Levin on bass in this clip.
@@richardshansky3040This is not about the video, but about Bill's notes in the description, talking about Wetton's ability to recognize a good track.
Yes, he said that Wetton was the best bassist of his generation, equal to Pastorious
He was a brilliant musician. He’s badly missed. His singing made some of King Crimson’s best music hauntingly beautiful and profound. I had the good fortune to see the band in his earliest years, touring Lark’s Tongues in Aspic and Starless. His singing cuts to the heart.
My ex-wife has a "Red" ringtone on her phone for when I call her! 😄
She knows what’s up! 🎶
El único grupo de Rock Progresivo, que logró volver a partir de los 80 y no dar lástima. Todo lo contrario. Genios.
I was in college in the late eighties, and listening to some Peter Gabriel (I think it was) with some friends, and made the offhand comment, "Tony Levin is such an amazing bassist - can you imagine if he were in a band with Bill Bruford?" (Whom we had all admired from his work with Yes.) At which point my friends said, "There IS such a band!" and put on Discipline. It was both astounding and completely different from what I was expecting. And my first conscious introduction to both Fripp and Belew.
I love this story. It reminds me of when I first heard _The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway_ on the radio (also in the 80s). I thought it sounded like ELP.
I wish I appreciated the double trio more when I saw this show.
I attended this show- it was on my birthday- and it's in my top 5 all time favorite shows. I especially remembered this number as I had only recently purchased the studio album "Red," and was eager to see ANY of that material performed live. You guys were just flat-out fantastic. I've recently turned my 15-yr old son to "Discipline," and he is firmly hooked. Which is a fine thing.
Good for you for passing it on! My daughter and son love them!! I have attended a few KC concerts in my life, by far they are the best!!
I was also there, right up front. It was a transcendent musical experience.
I was also at this show, they were awesome as expected. I even liked the Thrak album they were touring, thought it could have gotten a little more love. This version of Red slays!
Yep, great show. What date in '95 was it?
@@WakadooPlaypen June 26. I won’t lie, I had to look it up! Cut a bro some slack, it was almost 30 years ago! 😶🌫️😵💫🤪🙂
I bought the Red Album exactly in my 20th birthday in 1974 fresh from the presses and it became one of my old time Crimson favorites to this day as a 69 year old decrepit dude😂Peace!
Red, what a great tune and what an amazing album! A perfect swansong for that '74 version of the band. Not sure how many copies I've bought over the years for friends and family, but each copy was totally worth it.
This KC double trio really lays into it and does it justice. Belew, as always, tweaks the proceedings up a notch.
FANTASTIC SHOW. Icon of the 90's. I WAS THERE.
The double trio was an excellent incarnation of KC. I wasn’t sure about the two drummer configuration at first, but Bill and Pat really figured out great ways to play off of each other. And Trey was another stellar addition to the band.
Good heavens 👍 This is fantastic. I bought three tickets to the Wiltern Theater show on this tour. My drummer and bassist were outstanding professional musicians, so they couldn't afford to go. I fixed that with a credit card. The opening act, California Guitar Trio, floored us. Then, the Krim cleaned the floor.
I saw both June 29th and July 1st at the Wiltern!!!!
I think "heavy" is a good description, but also 'typically masterful' by king Crimson's virtuosos. My first time hearing King Crimson was an all-nighter with its first album, alternating with Mahavishnu Orchestra. I heard them both for the first time in 1971, back to back, over and over all night long. By the morning, 'I'd got it'. I think King Crimson should be ranked near to very top of 'progressive rock'- which is really an inadequate term for it. I first came to know the name Bill Bruford, from the many records I listened to. I kept seeing this name over and over. What a career!
Such an exciting line-up and a powerfully fun rendition of a classic.
Thank you sir Bill, it’s the best to woke up this morning, make my day!
Three Perfect Pairs!
I did what you see here.
Saw this tour stop in NYC, brilliant - especially Mr Bruford’s snare work!
I enjoyed reading your stories of Red. I consider Red to be heavy-ish but have always loved it. Glad ya'll kept it on the album. I love your description of this version of Red being "dinner-jacket heavy". Beautiful. Thank you.
What story about the album RED ? Where is this story of RED ? Inquiring minds want to know this chunk of useful information.
@@franks2bud Read the video description.
It's my cell phone ringtone! ❤❤
I was at that show. Fabulous.
This is my favorite piece of music. Glad it made it. I was also there that night.
Excellent tour! I saw it in Rochester, NY, sat in the front of the balcony and the sound and view was superb.
Pretty cool that they should play Rochester. ✌🏼😃
Always intense.. this never gets old.. thank u Robert Fripp!
No it doesn't.
Bill took the biggest paycut in rock and roll history.
Fabulous darling, thanks for this!
I got to see KC in Texas on their final tour a few years ago, the Covid tour. I took my band to the show and they sort of knew about Crimson. They opened with Pictures of a City and my drummer was glued to his seat, wide eyed and blown away. They had 3 drummers in front of the stage, the rest played on the stacks of speakers. I lost my mind when they played One more Red Nightmare and then later Red. Adrian Belew was not there but Mel Collins, the original KC sax player was and also Jakko, Tony and Pat. GREAT SHOW! Just Wow.
All my fav songs have Bill Bruford on drums, legendary
Heaviness comes from the emotional weight of the music, not from how loud it is. With certain songs like Starless, it might be hard to get back on your feet when the song ends. Most metal bands in the 80s got it all wrong but not Sabbath.
BLACK SABBATH WAS THE BEST GROUP OUT THEY ROCKED THE PEOPLE LIVE R ALBUM WHAT EVER LOVED K C.
Red, mi disco de cabecera, sencillamente ¡ IMPRESIONANTE !
I'm a latecomer to KC, my first show was on the 'Beat' tour (July '83) with Fripp/Belew/Bruford/Levin, and that lineup will always have a special place in my heart. Seeing all four of you in this clip warms my heart!
My brother that's Not Late😂! I saw them just a year before in Ann Arbor MI and low and behold twas only 13 yrs after conception and Now Wow, 42 years have gone by. So not late, just intime 😆😎✌️
I wasn't even alive yet
Fripp & Belew is total guitar heaven. Rest of the band also not too shabby 😉
I've never seen a clip for a show I actually attended. Until now. Thank you!
Maybe the best performance of Red, ever. Ferocious!
Glad to say I was there!
I'd totally freak out if it was the first time hearing them.
Just OUTSTANDING! I remember watching Adrian's band, The Bears in Cincinnati before he joined Crimson.
i'hve been loving them since17, still in love
Very cool. I attended this show. Unforgettable.
I was at this show- third row balcony, right next to the soundboard! Glad you use this track, Bill. That album supported many a late night card game!
Man I love that album
I'm a big fan of the Discipline Crew and the Double Trio doing earlier Crimson works such as this; shame that it was an uncommon occurrence for them to be performed but nonetheless, thank you in advance for this one
Great venue with the greatest band, this is the bee's knees.
We used to play this in the early 80s at parties and, only now, am I hearing this version! Amazing!!!
Thanks for the intro/commentary. Good added value!
Ferocious take !
after purchasing the Longplay and after just a few notes of the opener, I knew not just KC but music had stepped into another area. And everything sounded like Swan Song, too.
I was also at this show. It all went well until Adrian pulled out the drill for Thrakk. My then new girlfriend almost got up and walked out because she'd had a crap day at work, REALLY wanted a glass of wine but was denied by Robert's no alcohol mandate, and her back was killing her in the less than comfortable Warfield seats. We're still together but it was a very close call. After that we made a deal that I would never ask her to accompany me to a King Crimson concert!
That's a policy that has saved many relationships. Thrak can be music but it's just shy of assault if you aren't in the mood.
I was there! As was my son, who was 8 at the time and loved it.
I had the pleasure of seeing them at Artpark, Lewiston NY, they were absolutely Outstanding 👏😎👍
Brilliant performance. Love the commentary. Thanks Bill!
I saw this in Nuremberg 1995. It was a big surprise to me to hear Red. Happiness ❤ 1972-74 is my favourite KC time. Thank You Bill for memories 😊
Yes, I’m sure that 1972/74 is a rhythmic figure that King Crimson has woven into one of their compositions 😸👉🏼🧮♾️
I saw this iteration of KC in 1995 at the Auditorium Theater in Rochester NY (where Tony Levin and Steve Gadd lived when attending the Eastman School of Music!) Great show. I recall an old metalhead suddenly jumping up when Red was played and walking up and down the aisle - banging his head - because he just couldn't stay sitting. I *think* this is also the show where Robert suddenly stood up from his stool for just a minute or two - while playing. One would have thought that he did a backward flip through a burning hop onto a trampoline = the crowd went wild when eh stood up!
Full the Crimson Power !!! I Love it so much !!👍👍👍
thanks Bill, keep em coming, great memories!
John Wetton is my favorite bass player in the band but I've always loved Tony Levin. I found out about him on the ABWH album & tour then learned in retrospect he was on lots of Gabriel stuff, Pink Floyd's '87 album and Late in the Evening by Paul Simon (amongst many other stuff).
Paul Simon had a smoking band around the time of One Trick Pony. Levin on bass, Richard Tee on keys, Steve Gadd on drums and Eric Gale on guitar (basically the band Stuff minus 2). If you've never seen Stuff Live at Montreux 1976 you should check it out. Cheers
@@finnmcginn9931 will check it out after work. Thanks!
Hola.
Un tema de la época en la cual Bill había dejado Yes y pasó a integrar una de las mejores etapas de King Crimson.
En este video recreado magistralmente, con el Crimson que volvió en los 80' y se transformó en los 90" en el doble trío.
Gracias Bill.
Saludos desde ciudad de Canelones, Uruguay.
Vamo la Celeste vamo Bill Bruford!!!
I fondly remember this tour stop in Toronto and the last time I got to see you perform. Thanks for posting. Wishing you all the best Bill.
One of the greatest Band Projects ever! Epic!
probably the greatest show i ever saw was this band in 1996.
Bruford's snare sound gets me every time....
You still can't beat a dose of 70s Crim played by 90s Crim. Bruford never broke a stick in Crim. Impressive dynamic control that. Says a lot that John Wetton backed Fripp on Red's inclusion. He was right. And Wetton often seemed the most keen to keep Crim moving in the direction of towering, lumbering success.
Sensacional, pra mim esta é a melhor formação do KC
One of the great heavy rock songs of all time. Maybe the best.
I attended this show with my brothers. Sublime!
Red, my favorite album
Magnificent
I don’t know a drummer who couldn’t learn an important lesson from Bill Bruford. His metronomic, ‘as-written’ playing makes polyrhythm a reality on stage. Too many let the thrill drive their playing onstage and it drives the ensemble possiblities right off the rails. Bruford is not immune to this but he is an exception to the rule and I can’t get enough of it.
00.31 that Smoke on the Water chromatic bass thumping cliche riff by Sir Tony Levin is just brilliantly comical. Love this K C line up!
Got to see them in greensburg pa many yrs ago! With John p Jones !!!!
I love reading Bill's description along with the song
Great video.
I love that fking snare sound
Love your stories Bill. You got my sub. On two accounts. 😊
Wondoerful❤❤❤❤❤
Love this album, personal favorite of mine and always in my cars CD player
thumbs up if you've heard Bill Buford in UK. the band. with john wetton, allan holdsworth, and edie jobson.
As a Holdsworth fanatic I thank you.
A great rendition of my favorite pieces of all time. You are too humble. Heavy is not, as you point out, about sweating biceps or whatever. The truth is hundreds of metal bands have sold their souls to try to achieve this level of brutality, and completely failed. The reason is that they forgot music has to be beautiful as well. Your performance on the original album version of this song is one of the greatest drum performances I know of. thank you for posting this!
Best live band!!!!
I was there for all 3 nights!
Wow! Just fucking wow! 😮
Totally unreal...WOW!!!
Wow
the one and only ❤🔥
Yeahhhhhhhhhh thanks
Bill with his canary yellow Drum set! 👍👍👍
I leard that it has now been given to the guys in the Beat lineup, though it is quite a different shape to Denis Carey's usual setup.
I saw it recently, on sale at Graham Russell Drums in Fareham, Hampshire, England, when they hosted an auction sale of all Bill's performing gear on his retirement.
Well, it only took 3 guitarists and 2 drummers to recreate that enormous energy of the original version on the album 🙃 .. just proves some things cant be bettered.. never in the same river twice
So, I never heard any KC music before about three years ago. Thankfully, I now have the best-sounding stereo system I've ever heard and am finding out about a lot of bands I knew nothing about. Making up for wasted time!
Poseidon and Lizard are absolutely symphonic on a good stereo/5.1 system. Rock on.
I was always a little ambivalent about the double trio years in the same way I was about the Yes:Union situation. Apples and oranges of course but I felt like it became too busy and confusing a stage show to fully digest. I became a Crimson fan in the early 80's and saw the NYC show that was outdoors by the aircraft carrier museum which I think had to be the Three of a Perfect Pair tour. I was in high school at the time but it was so exciting to see how this music was played by just 4 guys. And so all those years later on the Thrak tour I was happy that Crimson were back together but I was almost 30 by then and somehow it just didn't move me like it did when I was a teenager. The live show that is. I enjoyed the Thrak album though.
Piel de gallina
Hey, I was at that show!
That is pure filth! I love it.
filthy sweet prog metal
i would've given anything to have seen this concert (or similar one from this tour)
Esa batería Tama de Bill, cuando no está se extraña y mucho.
By all means.... :)
This is heavy-heavier than anything that could claim to be heavy.
I was there!
To be honest, Mr. Bruford, I *still* haven't warmed to this song's original studio recording. No matter how many times I listen to it, I always find myself mentally nodding off well before the end. It's a decent tune, but I find it hard to understand why Rolling Stone put it in their Top 100 Guitar Songs - although the fact that that list also includes songs like "Born to Run" by Bruce Springsteen, where guitar is conspicuous only by its near-absence, suggests to me that in many cases they didn't really listen to the song, just took an artist who was known for having a good guitarist and selected one of their better-known songs. To close this post on a positive note, I'd say this rendition of "Red" solidly beats the studio version, having much more energy and dynamics.
The hammer.
interesting final paragraph...I watched some Billy Joel concert highlights on TV many years ago.Devitto was hitting his cymbals so hard that they made NO SOUND...you could see him pummeling them...see them moving...but producing ZERO sound...
"Being in King Crimson is a little like having a low-grade infection: you're not really sick, but you don't feel well, either."
- Trey Gunn
...and yet, he played with them for, what, 10 years or so?
I love this song and this performance, but man, there's something about it that's almost demonic. I was imagining how Red could work as a theme song for the opening of a totalitarian political party convention, with all the attendees marching in time to the driving rhythm, and during some of the quieter passages performing individual interpretive dances that reflect martial themes with slashing, stomping and bayoneting motions. No idea what Robert Fripp was actually trying to convey with this composition, but it can have a rather unsettling effect, and the album in its entirety has an air of melancholy and foreboding. Perhaps working through such reactions is part of the thrill of powerful music.