Is Robert Fripp Overrated?

HackettFan wrote: In fact, the comparison between Fripp and Emerson is quite interesting. Fripp is often complimented for his restraint and lack of showboating, which is quite a contrast from Emerson who didn't even want a guitarist (electric guitarist) in the band to compete with. Sometimes I ponder whether Fripp took that restraint too far.

I don't think he did...  the one who was guilty of that was Hatchet... he needed to leave the bland soporific Genesis before the full range his full and substantial talent could be utilized and bloomed. It is no coincidence that 70's Genesis was only really interesting when they took the shackles off of Hatchet. His shackling was #2 on my list of great prog crimes of the 70's.. the first of course being someone sticking a microphone in front of Latimer when they had enlisted Sinclair..  prog fans can forgive some thing.. but some things go beyond our endurance and capactiy to forgive haha.

dr wu23 wrote: 23 pages on this...?

you obviously missed the greatest thread in PA's history when two of the most stubborn and pigheaded collaborators ever to grace the site spent 20 pages debating the release date of Fragile   Oh how the red and blue font's flowed....

and I won of course..


Edited by micky - April 17 2016 at 10:41

I don't remember where it was.. it might have been in the collab zone so not available for all to see. it was back when I joined and was made a collaborator (against the wishes of the then admin team I might add.. oh they knew..  oh yes they did ).. so around 2005 2006.

micky wrote: I don't remember where it was.. it might have been in the collab zone so not available for all to see. it was back when I joined and was made a collaborator (against the wishes of the then admin team I might add.. oh they knew..  oh yes they did ).. so around 2005 2006.

Did a google search simply typing Micky Ivan release date of Fragile and this was the first result: http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=16568&PN=7

hahaha.. god I love that man...

Yeah.. we do have quite the history. He brought me here, drafted me from the DDD website, pretty much told a unconvinced admin team I needed to be a collab. Always clicked... but rarely agreed. We didn't really debate trite matters like this too often. We started here and moved upwards quickly in stakes and resulting vitriol. Next it was for the hand of Raff as the symphonic team love triangle of Ivan, Raff and myself became a vehicle for wooing Raff. I thought Ivan had won that race, he was everything I wasn't. Handsome exotic, intellgient.. till one day when Raff sent me a PM and said she wanted me so badly and wanted to make my hair stand up straight and wanted to travel to the states and spend a week of unrestrained passion in the mountains of N.C... which we promtly did. So Ivan lost that one..

then came the battle royale.. of which again I prevailed.  RPI v. Symphonic. He had me fought to a standstill in that Operation Barbarossa sized PA's battle of wils and firepower.  That unfortunately is when things got nasty and we both started mass assasinations.. of each others character and of each others supporters. It got so bad the admin team finally did have to step in and M@X got off his fat ass and got involved.. and declared me the winner and gave us the seperate RPI genre and the means to take groups we wanted for it.


oh good times.  Frustrating at times but always a challenge.  Ivan has well earned his #2 position in pantheon of greatest PA's members ever.  Anyone who has dared debate him will never forget the experience. Intelligent, tenacious, and underhanded. Just like me, I just had the advantage of fighting for the right, be it factual or common sense. That was my edge.


as to the question. Good point about Fripp. Wasn't it said he considered Lake, Greg Lake to be a far better guitar player than he was. His talent wasn't as some god of guitar playing, it was as mastermind and guiding force of King Crimson. One of the 3 greatest and perhaps the single most infuential of all prog groups.