EPITAPH, VOLUMES ONE & TWO

I believe that a person that buy an expensive CD like these without knowing anything about their sound quality and after that begin to complain everywhere about its bootleg quality is a j@ck@ss. The intention about the whole concept of these KC audio albums is to show to the public a better balanced bootleg, with an extra bonus of some insights by Fripp himself. Well we all know that you can hear them anywhere on the web before buying it so why risk your hard-earned money without purpose? Just to cry about being misguided on the whole bootleg thing?

Bootlegs are the only way different of going to a live concert to hear how the band you like really sounds. I love live albums and own a lot of them but the manipulations made in the studio to "correct" what should be a sonic picture of an unique moment doesn't leave to us much of the real thing. So they are extremely important to the music fan, specially the rock one. Can't see any "ethical" problem in them although I understand the musicians point of view (nobody wants to show a possible "bad" picture to the world). And today on the internet days the awful black market of bootlegs were largely been substituted by the peer-to-peer culture that increases the possibility of getting more music from the musicians you love and expand your knowledge on the ones you don't know. So long live the boot seeders.

Back to the show: never been a big fan of KC but only fot their first album I was blessed to hear these gems by an web friend. The sound is of an A bootleg specially when you know the year and condition the tapes were recorded you can't be anything less than satisfied about the audio quality.

The music is great and the musicians played it very well. The omnipresence of the mellotron is the greatest point of these shows. Lake delivered one of his most memorable performances, despite his young age and the whole band is very tight. But McDonald's tron catch my attention all through the record.

If you already own the couple of albums with KC's first line-up you know what to expect about the set. As "Poseidon" wasn't recorded (nor the music composed, I believe) only hints of "Picture of a city" and "The Devil's Triangle" (aka "Mars, the Bringer of war" from Gustav Holst) were played on this tour. So there are some repetition of tracks from the first album with variable quality of sound.

From the infinite number of KC live albums released through the years I believe there are only two essentials to the average rock fan: the remastered "USA" and this baby. Both cover the most important line-ups from the band (the first and the last - I don't consider the Discipline band the same thing) with a set list that sinthesizes the quintessential KC sound alive. Having this said I believe this collection is an essential addition to any rock collection - 5 stars. And go to Hell whoever cries about botleg quality.