In the Court of the Crimson King (Toby Amies) (2022)
Knowing it was a documentary that looked back at the history of the seminal ‘rock’ group King Crimson, when I first looked at the description of this film in IMDB, I was a little confused. The description said “Documentary, Comedy, Horror”.
Documentary, sure. Comedy, well, okay. But horror??
Even before I started the movie, it clicked. It is Robert Fripp’s extremely arch sense of humour at work. I thought back to the days when he and Eno were producing what to me were by far David Bowie’s best albums, Low, Lodger, and Heroes. I remember a cover story at the time on Fripp and Eno that appeared in the music mag Melody Maker with the title “We’re Only in it for the Groupies”. Anybody who knows these most cerebral of master musicians immediately realized this was just a ruse, the kind of prank they liked to play on the promotional side of the music industry. Clearly the same sensibility was at play in the IMDB descriptors.
Once the movie, which manages to include interviews from most of the many musicians who have been been part pf Crimso, got under way, it became clear that the ‘horror’ referred to was the discipline demanded by King Crimson’s leader, Robert Fripp from the ever-changing lineup. From near its beginning, KC has been a vehicle for his musical imagination, and if you couldn’t deliver what he was asking for, you didn’t last long. The thing is, the music of King Crimson is fiendishly difficult to play, ranging widely across styles and time signatures, sometimes demanding exact performance, sometimes demanding free improvisation, and covering many bases in between.
Even if the you don’t like their music, you might still enjoy this documentary because it covers a fascinating crew of characters from disparate backgrounds, somehow managing to weld themselves into a series of mostly unified wholes. Well, part of the time anyway; some of the departures, not all of which were orchestrated by Fripp, were and remain fractious. You really get a sense of how difficult it is to create and maintain this kind of creative ensemble.
But assuming you are a fan, there is plenty of good music to enjoy, though very few extended performances, which in a way is no surprise considering how long some of the songs are. Fortunately there are plenty of other live performances available to watch to listen to.
But very few bootlegs. Fripp is notorious for his insistence that none of the performances be recorded in any form other than memory by audience members. We even get a brief clip of an offender getting busted prior to his recording being deleted. When I saw a solo Fripp performance many years ago, I was initially a little nonplussed by this insistence, but eventually I came around, and if you watch the discussions around the issue in this doc I think you will come around to Fripp’s attitude as well. Yes, he’s the ultimate control freak when it comes to his music, but that is a key part part of the system he has created that makes it so compelling.
So if you are a King Crimson fan, line up this doc and a concert film, and you’ll have an edifying and enjoyable evening.
imdb.com |
