STARLESS AND BIBLE BLACK

Starless and Bible Black which is the sixth album from King Crimson might be my least favoured one. It continues the trend set with Larks´ Tongues in Aspic which I wasn´t too impressed with either. The second era of King Crimson with both albums belong to is very dark and pretty heavy. Unfortunately on Starless and Bible Black the music is also mostly of the jamming kind, which is something I think belongs in a live environment and not on a studio album.

The only songs I can say I like are the two opening songs The great deceiver and Lament. Fracture which ends the album is pretty good too and sometimes reminds me of the Larks´ Tongues in Aspic part II which ended that album. If King Crimson had shortened Starless and Bible Black down to an EP contained these three songs it would have been a great EP, but unfortunately we are treated with one after another of terrible instrumental songs which are just jams. No structure and all dissonant noise. No thank you. The night watch is a vocal song like the two first songs on the album though it just doesn´t have the quality of those.

The musicianship is very good, but I wish the very prominant musicians playing on this album would have used their talents wiser.

The production is very good even though I think the vocals sounds like they were recorded in the loo. But that was the same with Larks´ Tongues in Aspic.

I´m not very impressed and quite frankly I´m a bit disappointed with Starless and Bible Black. All the talent on display here should have brought something special with it, but unfortunately these brilliant musicians were too lazy and only wanted to jam. Horrible dissonant jams. 2 stars and that´s only because I like the three mentioned songs. This is definitely a fan only album.