ROBERT FRIPP

An album I picked up as soon as it came out (back when I was a daily frequenter of the local records stores). The idea of the album intrigued me--though I never expected Summers to hold his own against the Fripp-genius. Still, knowing the diversity of styles Señor Robert had tried (and having been an avid fan of it all), and seeing Andy's ventures into the world of synthesized sounds, I had to give it a try. And I gave it far more attention than perhaps it even deserved. Don't get me wrong: it's all very likable--with a couple songs that even made regular rotations on my driving cassette tapes--and it does represent the technology of the times (what we thought might be the future of music, at the time)-- but there's really little here to demand shouting from the rooftops. Plus, it's predecessor, I Advance Masked, was fresh and refreshing; this one does little new.

The less beloved younger brother of I Advance Masked sees Robert Fripp and Andy Summers dial back on the improvisational, texture-based, ambient-oriented approach of that album and focus instead on more composed pieces which fit closer to a conventional art rock sound. The end result is inevitably somewhat less innovative, though since Fripp was coming down off the shuttering of the 1980s incarnation of King Crimson perhaps he was simply in a less experimental mood at the time. It's an enjoyable listen but it's not quite as eye-opening as the first collaboration between the duo, but if you're in the market for New Wave-inclined background music it's not so bad.

The product of a couple of stints of recording from just just before and a bit after the sessions for King Crimson's Beat, Andy Summers and Robert Fripp's I Advance Masked sees the Police and King Crimson guitarists going on a journey of ambient guitar exploration. Naturally, it's like nothing in the Police catalogue, and there's precious little in the King Crimson repertoire which resembles it, beyond some of the more ambient and outre instrumental passages on their 1980s albums, the resemblence largely coming from Fripp chewing over similar guitar ideas there as here.

The closest comparison, however, is to an even more guitar-oriented take on Fripp's collaborations with Eno or his solo work, with the dual lead approach here allowing Fripp to intertwine his guitar sound with Summers much as he would with Adrian Belew in King Crimson at the same time. The end result is more thoughtful, less intrusive, more ambiently inclined, and less tempestuous than Fripp or Summers' day jobs, and it's a solid piece of work provided you weren't expecting Elephant Talk or Every Breath You Take.

Although it wasn't released until 2018, this excellent value 3 CD box set was recorded at 3 Travis and Fripp concerts in 2009 and 2010, between their first and second albums. Their musical dialogue began when Travis asked Fripp to add some of his trademark Frippertronics to his album Double Talk; their first album as a duo was then recorded in a single day. As well as his jazz and prog excursions, Theo Travis uses a loop and delay set up, Ambitronics, for solo performances, which makes him a fitting musical sparring partner for Robert Fripp.

What you get is almost three hours of, on the surface, pastoral sounding washes of flute and soprano sax floating over the almost orchestral sound of Robert Fripp's multi layered guitar. The softer texture of the wind and reed instruments smooths the rougher edges of the guitarist's soundscapes, although harsher, more dissonant sounds occasionally rise to the surface. Some musical themes recur across the three discs, but the two musicians use them as a springboard for improvisation so the repetition isn't particularly obvious or grating. In addition to their own repertoire, King Crimson's Moonchild and Fripp's At The End of Time crop up a couple of times each, along with a brief snatch of The Power To Believe. The overall mood is calm and meditative, but this music repays repeated and careful listening.

These three concerts were followed by a short European tour in 2011, and subsequent Travis and Fripp albums were assembled from that. How badly you need this album depends on how much you like Frippertronics; three stars seems like an appropriate rating, but add another star if you're a Fripp aficionado.

(If you're impressed by Theo Travis's Ambitronics, his albums with John Foxx are also well worth investigating.)

Variations on a familiar and well-loved theme.

In 2006 the Starless theme surfaced in a couple of Robert Fripp's solo concerts, and these extracts were passed on to David Cross. With the help of producer and keyboard player Tony Lowe, he fashioned them into this pleasing album, which consists of just under an hour's worth of ethereal violin, Frippertronics and washes of of electronic keyboards that recall the Mellotron on mid 70s Crimson albums. Variations on the theme are explored by different permutations of the three players, and while the overall effect is gentle and meditative, it doesn't slip into new age muzak or out and out ambience; beneath the tranquil surface there is some serious musicality.

If you're hoping for King Crimson style pyrotechnics, look elsewhere. If you're looking for good background music for late nights spent contemplating the infinite, this could sit nicely alongside Fripp and Eno's Equatorial Stars.

3.5 stars.

Electric guitars, synthesizers, guitar synth, bass guitar, and percussion. That is what this album provides in spades, all generated by our two protagonists without any outside help. Let it be said here that if you're a fan of either Robert Fripp or Andy Summers (or both), I Advance Masked (recorded in September 1981 and May 1982) is a "must listen" as these performances find them in especially abstract, exploratory moods.

40+ years after its release, and rumors still persist that this is an ambient album (song titles, perhaps) when nothing could be further from the truth. Listen to the aggressive, driving title track, the speedy picking in the Eno-esque "China - Yellow Leader", and fast and furious songs like "New Marimba" and "Still Point". There are quieter moments, such as "Under Bridges of Silence" and "Girl on a Swing", but these are distinctly in the minority. Some will not care for the 1980s cliches such as the synth washes and electric sitar ("Hardy Country") used from time to time, but there is just too much going on to comfortably fit anyone's attempt to stereotype. Tracks such as "The Truth of Skies" and "Seven on Seven" have an almost unsettling "bizarreness" to them and keep this album from ever becoming dated. "Lakeland/Aquarelle" seems to be improvised, and "Stultified" closes with an emphatic gong.

For those who are wondering, Fripp is the dominant performer (especially on "In the Cloud Forest") on this recording in spite of Summers being first billed. Of course, in 1982 Summers had by far the most high-profile name in the marketplace, so that stands to reason. At the same time, I'm told he was going through a divorce at the time, so this album does not have the best of memories for him. Nevertheless, I Advance Masked is unequivocally a 4-star album, and the average listener should find it sonically closer to Ghost in the Machine than to Beat. I'll close by insisting that if the catchy yet atmospheric "Painting and Dance" had been released as a single, it would have been HUGE.

Compiles and condenses the choicest cuts from Fripp's brief residency at Washington Square Church from late July to early August 1981. This would have been at a time when King Crimson's Discipline was recorded, but had not yet released - but rather than previewing the sound of that album, these small solo concerts were if anything a mild step back to 1979 and his Frippertronic shows undertaken in that year, prior to Fripp pivoting back to band projects (with the League of Gentlemen project coming and going, the Discipline project forming, and then the new King Crimson emerging from out of Discipline).

If you've heard Let the Power Fall or the God Save the Queen side of God Save the Queen/Under Heavy Manners, you know what to expect here; if you haven't, you'd probably be best advised to check out the reissues of those before you opt for even more Frippertronics. This is good, but between this and Fripp's other releases in this vein (both by himself and with Eno) it does seem like the format has its limitations and you only need so much of this stuff.

Don't come to Fripp's second solo album expecting any of the surprisingly tight pop numbers of Exposure, or a return to the approach of King Crimson; Fripp seems to have decided to spend the rest of his short solo career of 1978-1981 (after which he returned to band work) concentrating on exploring the possibilities of Frippertronics, a recording technique developed by Fripp and Eno when they made their mid-1970s albums. This entailed Fripp's guitar playing being recorded to tape and played back on loop as the performance continued - so raw Frippertronic pieces begin sparse and become more and more layered, and Fripp ends up soloing opposite himself. It's a simple gimmick which is used to rather charming effect.

Although the liner notes to the subsequent Let the Power Fall claimed that that album picked up where God Save the Queen left off, it's perhaps truer to say that Let the Power Fall and the God Save the Queen side of this release overlap: both were recorded on Fripp's summer 1979 Frippertronics tour of small venues, but whereas the performances on Let the Power Fall span from June to August, the God Save the Queen tracks all came from appearances on July 30th.

Between this and Let the Power Fall, you have pretty much all the Frippertronics experiments you could want, most likely, unless you're such an addict to the schtick that you want to splash out on the Exposures boxed set, which contains more Frippertronics concerts than anyone could possibly know what to do with. The same constraints that affect the form when played live apply just as much here as there, though in both cases Fripp does a good job of using those constraints as a springboard for creativity. If you liked the Fripp and Eno albums, you'll probably also enjoy much of this.

Particularly noteworthy is 1983, a foreboding track in which Fripp is able to evoke a range of haunting new sounds which sets it apart from much of the rest of his Frippertronic material in how far it goes into the dark landscapes it evokes; think of it as the Frippertronic answer to Eno's Ambient 4: On Land.

The Under Heavy Manners side of the equation is an experiment in Discotronics - taking a Frippertronics performance and then layering more stuff over it. There's funky bass; there's a drum loop; on the title track itself there's even a (pseudonym-disguised) David Byrne, making it sound a bit like an off-cut from My Life In the Bush of Ghosts (which makes sense because this would be around the time that album was being put together, and Fripp guested on it). Fripp, perhaps, was already tiring of the constraints of working as a 100% independent "highly mobile unit" and was looking for ways in which his newly-expanded guitar palette could be applied in a band context.

After this Fripp would more or less jump to working in a band context - first in the League of Gentlemen, then in Discipline, and then Discipline surprised everyone (including Fripp) by metamorphosing into a revived King Crimson. Although Fripp would do occasional subsequent Frippertronic concerts, the success of the new King Crimson would soon take up much of his time; although he would do occasional solo records subsequent to this, it would be in pursuit of the "Soundscapes" technique, taking advantage of new technologies to perform something akin in creative spirit to Frippertronics but distinct in execution. So between this and Let the Power Fall, and the recently issued Washington Square Church concert recordings, you really capture the peak of Frippertronics.

Though released in 1981 (along with the sole album from the brief League of Gentlemen new wave band project), Let the Power Fall actually dates from Fripp's burst of solo activity in 1979 - a year when he released his first solo album, recorded his second, and instead of doing a full-band tour opted to perform in unusual venues (like music shops and the like) as just him, his guitar and pedals, and a tape setup to perform "Frippertronics". The idea was to act as a "highly mobile unit" - taking the DIY ethos of the era to the next level - and some of the results are found on this album, which compiles some of the Frippertronic improvisations from these shows.

The way Frippetronics works inevitably means that all the tracks are somewhat samey: each starts out with Fripp and a blank tape. He plays some guitar; the sound goes on the tape; the Frippertronic tape system then replays what's been recorded so far and Fripp adds a further level of music. As such, every composition starts out fairly sparse and simple, and then becomes more ornately layered as the track progresses.

This was all pioneered by Fripp and Eno on their collaborations, but here Fripp is doing a deep dive into the art form, doing what he can to tease out fhte possibilities of a format which, whilst interesting, has certain restrictions. Inevitably, as time goes by the repeated phrases become softer and quieter as they become more overlaid by subsequent recordings. In some respects this is a strength; a harsh or discordant note is smoothed out by this process, an error can be "painted" over. In other respects, this constrainst Fripp in how he constructs tracks: he always tends to have some harsh, loud notes early on, because he knows he'll need to use them to construct the early layers of the track, and if he doesn't lay them in firmly at the start they'll get lost in the tape fairly quickly.

Let the Power Fall is honest about what it is - it bills itself as "an album of Frippertronics", and that is what you get. One such album is, to be honest, probably enough. Fripp would go very sparse on the solo albums after this - he's done much more as a collaborator or as a member of various band projects - and maybe part of the reason is that having satisfied himself here with the possibilities of what he can do with just himself and his equipment, he has only infrequently felt a need to do more.

The album is interesting both as a guitar-oriented ambient release - a rarity in the field - and as a snapshot of Fripp developing the sort of guitar tones he'd bring to the table in the 1980s incarnation of King Crimson, which was already coalescing when Fripp decided to release this onto the market. Perhaps, then, this was a farewell letter - however temporary - to Fripp's brief but interesting solo career of 1978-1981.

This is such a treat!

Robert Fripp at his best Fripperctronics which are as astounding as mysterious and beuatiful as it could get ,yet obscure and bright and in between.

What a treat. I wonder how the audience reacted to this marvel all way back in 1981 in NYC where there was non of this kind of electric guitar revolution happening but at the end of the day what a privilege to have heard this wonder.

This Robert Fripp - Washington Square Church (2022), was recorded as told in 1981 and then brought to life (for our ears) in 2022.

I am a follower of Fripp since I can not remember but this music reminds me of the past and future.

To put it in this work for future followers this is Progessive Electronic but all made up with electric guitar with tapes running around loops and solos interacting over them.

What can I say.........Creative truly. A genius at work live!

5 stars no less.