LARKS' TONGUES IN ASPIC

After the bland and boring Islands album, once again Robert Fripp changed over the lineup and the sound of King Crimson, and turned out one of the greatest prog rock albums ever recorded (if not the greatest). In fact, it was this album, when I borrowed it from my local library (in the seventies, libraries actually kept good music in their collections), that changed me from a casual prog listener to a full blown prog maniac.

Larks' Tongues In Aspic, Part One is one of the top prog masterpieces of all time, with amazing work from all players, and fantastic studio production. From Jamie Muir's tuned percussion intro, to Fripp's wild arpeggios, to the bone crunching power chords, this song is amazing from start to finish. It's too bad the live versions just don't do justice to this piece. Part Two is great as well, and is quite powerful, but Part One is just transcendent.

Book Of Saturday and Exiles allow the listener to catch a breath after the heaviness of the opening track. And although they are comparitively light, they are as entertaining as any of the softer Crimson works.

Easy Money is a more straight ahead rock song, and is helped quite a bit by Muir's crunchy rhythm sound and sparse percussion fills. And I'm glad they used different lyrics on this recording than on most of the live versions. Jokes about pedophilia just aren't funny.

The Talking Drum is a tension building jam, that buils with perfection, and leads with a scream into Larks' Tongues In Aspic, Part Two, a song that Fripp loves enough to have kept in the repertoire for three decades.

I wore out more copies of this album than any other in my collection. I rate this, on a scale of one to five, a ten.