Adrian Belew

I've always found Belew's eccentricities he brought to KC the 'wild card' Fripp needed to carry the band into the 80's. Just perfect - the guy could play, sing, and just infuse the whole package with lots of character. Things like Indiscipline, Elephant Talk, Neurotica and Dig Me are more Belew than Fripp. Priceless

Belew dreamed to be Lennon or Mac Carntey.  He would have really wanted to make a hit, but as he said in an old interview : "I shall never belong to Radioland". 

I like Discipline era very much, therefore I like Adrian Belew.

Someone mentioned above that Fripp 'fired' him...was that due to artistic differences or did Fripp just want more of the retro sound that Jako can bring?

Slartibartfast wrote: I saw King Crimson live for the first time on the Discipline.  Totally fine with his guitar, vocals, and lyrics.  And I also agree with hellogoodbye.  I'd also add his solo work, and his work with The Bears.

questionsneverknown wrote: Big fan. Loved the Discipline-era, and I still have fond memories of seeing that band live near its end, on the Three of a Perfect Pair tour. Thought the Thrak-era was also marvelous, noisy and inventive. Lone Rhino and Twang Bar King also had a big impact on me at the time. Never fully understood all the hostility toward the man.

I agree with every word. Loved Lone Rhino and Twang Bar King. Desire Caught By the Tail is my favorite. I may have even discovered his solo stuff first before his KC stuff. I can't remember. I also don't understand the hostility, then again, I've found similar hostility to Zappa, so I think there's a sort of west coast quirkiness that some traditional Prog fans just don't get, though they're fine with a PG brand of quirkiness. A cultural thing, I guess maybe.

Oh, and I love the Crimson Projekts album, Space Groove.

Edited by HackettFan - August 11 2015 at 21:40

Adrian Belew never cared for him with Crimson (or Zappa for that matter).  Decent musician but I can't tell you what he added that was good to Crimson.  Will always love the 'Larks' Tongues' & 'Red' era.

He was brilliant with KC. But I love his work with Laurie Anderson, Talking Heads and Bowie. 

Totally essential to the Crim sound.

94-03 rules!!!

Discipline is my favourite KC album and probably in my top 5 albums of all time. I think I saw them playing it live even before I had the album. It just put a smile on my face when I heard the material for the first time and Belew came out with "talk talk, it's only talk" on "Elephant Talk". (I'm a Talk Talk fan to this day ). Discipline was something new and exciting and I think his influence was strong in that line-up. Beat and Perfect Pair are also high on my list, as is Thrak (I'm not so keen on much of what came later).

The thing is, his singing style was quite different from traditional prog from the 70s, sharper, more urban New Wave, same with his lyrics, many of which I like, but this could explain why many 70s prog lovers couldn't warm to him. Fripp was moving in this direction at the time, too, so I can't really say how much of it was Belew's influence and how much was Fripp (or Bruford or Levin), but I think that Belew was important for them to find a consistent style at the time; Fripp was trying out many small things and didn't show a clear direction before Discipline.