King Crimson: THRAK

KING CRIMSON: THRAK (1995)

1) VROOOM; 2) Coda: Marine 475; 3) Dinosaur; 4) Walking On Air; 5) BʼBoom; 6) THRaK; 7) Inner Garden I; 8) People; 9) Radio I; 10) One Time; 11) Radio II; 12) Inner Garden; 13) Sex Sleep Eat Drink Dream; 14) VROOOM VROOOM; 15) VROOOM VROOOM: Coda.

General verdict: A slightly cellulitish variant of King Crimson for the Grunge Age — but the mix of nostalgia with then-current production trends still works fine for me.

No band has ever proven itself to be so adaptable to each new musical time period as King Crimson has — that is, of course, if we are talking intelligent adaptations that still allow the music to be easily recognizable and identifiable, while at the same time reflecting and honoring the most serious new musical developments of each period. But as years, and decades, went by, adaptation to new musical developments became harder — simply because it became harder to identify these new developments. And it is not merely old age that has resulted in a lack of properly «iconic» new albums from King Crimson past their third (or was that fourth?) traditional resurrection. It is also the fact that in 1994-95, it was not exactly clear who could serve as Frippʼs new source of inspiration. Last time we checked, it was Talking Heads. But in the mid-1990s? Kurt Cobain? Black Francis? Alanis Morissette?

Still, far be it from us to suggest that Frippʼs brain cells might have gotten too rusty or confused in a period which was, after all, more or less the very last hooray period for rock music in general. On the formal scale, change was reflected in the adoption of a «Double Trio» format — all the players from the Discipline lineup were back, but now augmented with a second bassist (Trey Gunn, an actual graduate of Frippʼs Guitar Craft school) and a second drummer (Pat Mastelotto); apparently, Fripp had acquired this love for weird symmetries, or, perhaps, it was just a part of his evil plan to tone down the presence and influence of Bruford, who was almost supposed not to be part of this new show, but allegedly shamed Robert into letting him back in.

On the substantial scale, the very title of the album (THRAK), as well as that of the mini-album which preceded it with several alternate versions of the same songs (VROOOM), already sort of suggests something fairly brutal and violent — and while it would be pushing things way too far to call this phase King Crimsonʼs «grunge period», I am absolutely certain that the grunge and alt-rock explosion of the early 1990s could not have gone unnoticed by the man who had already, to a large degree, predicted the New Wave revolution, and to an even larger degree, embraced it more wholeheartedly than any of his peers when it did come. In a way, THRAK is a synthesis of the heavy, infernal math-rock of KCʼs Larksʼ Tongues / Red period with the polygonal futurism of their Discipline era — you can think of it as a more structured and disciplined take on Larks or as a heavier, more metallic take on Discipline, it works in both directions. The problem is that when you are able to slap on such a precise definition, the effect becomes predictable, and so THRAK no longer has the capacity of blowing your mind in the same sudden ways as the three previous incarnations of King Crimson could.

Which is not to say that THRAK is not an excellent, consistent, thoroughly enjoyable set of tunes for which I have the same type of love and admiration as, say, the Stonesʼ Voodoo Lounge — we know very well what to expect at this point, but there is still enough inspiration from the general spirit of the times to keep on infecting you even 25 years later. With the exception of a few minor transitional links, every major composition on THRAK has plenty of energy, one or more thick instrumental hooks, and tons of atmosphere. The doubled rhythm sections make the songs seem lumpy and bulgy, but the professionalism of the players gives them all the precision and agility of a raging hippo — or, perhaps, a T-Rex would be a better analogy, given the title of one of the albumʼs most memorable songs, to which we will be coming shortly.

The meat part of any KC album are always the instrumentals, whose titles this time around bring on associations with Batman comics or Jackie Chan movies more than anything else: ʽTHRAKʼ, ʽVROOOMʼ, ʽBʼBoomʼ, ʽVROOOM VROOOMʼ (for all I know, they might be hidden acronyms, but whoʼs crazy enough to want to find out?). And already the first one of these, ʽVROOOMʼ, is an absolutely shameless variation on the melodic structure and atmosphere of ʽRedʼ — one fanfare-like opening riff, one slowly winding main riff, a quiet mid-section (though here, more than anywhere else, the jangly geometry of Discipline is being shown off), and then coming back around full circle for the coda. The riffs are memorable and the band still pushes ahead with all the ferocity of a freshly oiled old Panzer, but one listen to this track is also enough to understand why THRAK will never be remembered with the same sense of awe as its predecessors — as brutal as it may sound, the level of self-plagiarism is through the roof here. That may have been the intention — here we are, making up a new ʽRedʼ for a new generation of music players and music listeners — but these intentions are limited by definition. I actually think that the extended ʽCoda: Marine 475ʼ conclusion to the track is more interesting — unlike the self-plagiarizing ʽRedʼ-based main body of ʽVROOOMʼ, this part sounds more like a King Crimson attempt to put together the codas of ʽI Am The Walrusʼ and ʽI Want You (Sheʼs So Heavy)ʼ and see what happens when you give them the «double trio» treatment.

The impression does not change much when you go through the rest of the instrumentals. Heavy echoes of ʽLarksʼ Tongues In Aspicʼ (both parts), on one hand, and ʽThela Hun Ginjeetʼ and the like, on the other, resonate all through ʽTHRAKʼ and particularly ʽVROOOM  VROOOMʼ; only ʽBʼBoomʼ is different in that it is mainly a skill show for the bandʼs percussionists, with a tribal jungle sound that, for once, does not seem to have any direct analogies in KCʼs past — but letʼs admit it, we have hardly come here with a primary goal of hearing Bruford and Mastelotto play off each other for four minutes.

In the end, THRAKʼs main attraction are its vocal numbers — not entirely original, either, but not as blatantly ripping off past frameworks as the instrumentals. I suppose that Belew should be taking a lot of credit for these. Over an entire decade separating Three Of A Perfect Pair from THRAK, Adrian had grown into a major solo artist in his own right, with four first-rate albums of neo-Beatlesque pop under his belt, and although the base aesthetics of King Crimson strictly prohibits him from sneaking any of those blatantly pop melodies past Inspector Fripp, some of that classic Beatles spirit, particularly its moody and psychedelic parts, still manage to get smuggled in — see ʽPeopleʼ, for instance, with its ʽTomorrow Never Knowsʼ-influenced back­ward guitar solos and ominously repetitive riff in the coda (once again, highly reminiscent of ʽI Want Youʼ). On the other hand, even Belew slips into formula every now and then: the gently dreamy ballad ʽWalking On Airʼ borrows many elements from ʽMatte Kudasaiʼ, a fact that is hard to hide even behind all the extra layers of guitar complexity that this new decade has brought in. (Amusingly, its lyrics also make reference to "sheltering sky", as if we really needed one more reminder of the greatness of Discipline).

Still, the album does contain two of my favourite KC vocal numbers of all time. The already mentioned ʽDinosaurʼ reflects Belewʼs usual eco-minded themes, though the lyrics are clever enough to yield to both universal (inevitable extinction of man) and personal (inevitable extinction of ME) interpretation — what matters most, though, is the slow, lumbering, brooding atmosphere, with lots of dry, creaky, sustained notes that make you picture this very large, very old, very rusty entity that is nevertheless still clinging to life with all the power it can muster, still strong enough to shoo away all the petty youngsters.

Even more catchy — and more terrifying, when you stop for long enough to truly ponder its symbolism — is ʽSex Sleep Eat Drink Dreamʼ, the portrait of the human being as a simplistically programmed genetic machine with severely limited functionality, hung high up on the nail of one of the most distinctly memorable bass riffs in KC history and featuring Belew in total meat zombie mode: "sex... sleep... eat... drink... dream... sex... sleep... eat... drink... dream..." (listen closely and you will see that only the word ʽdreamʼ in this chain is slightly drawn out, with a tiny bit of tenderness involved — creepy, lately I have been noticing it too that dreaming is becoming the most enjoyable part of my life). If the entire album is nowhere close to a masterpiece, ʽSex Sleep Eat Drink Dreamʼ might arguably be the last properly great song in King Crimsonʼs entire catalog — at least, it is definitely the last King Crimson song that has managed to etch itself a permanent position in the back of my brain.

Summing up, I must point out that normally I experience a sense of disappointment with albums like these — seeing great artists clearly making an effort to progress and ultimately failing because even the greatest ones have their natural limits. But despite its obvious shortcomings, THRAK still holds up as a positive, rather than pathetic, experience. It is an album that says to you, «my main goal is to tell you that King Crimson are still alive and that they are aware that musical fashions have shifted once again», but it is written and produced by people who still have not run out of impressive riffs, catchy vocal melodies, and well-disciplined collective energy to pull it all off with gusto. Fripp himself, as far as I know, does not like to remember this period with too much fondness (probably because he never thought reteaming with Belew and Bruford would be such a great idea), and in the overall critical eye it also seems to somehow have slipped through the cracks, but I think that in the general perspective, it was still more innovative and creative than the Construkction Of Light period, for instance. At the very least, like I said, it would be a pity to have the 1990s, arguably the last properly creative decade for rock music, to have remained without an actual King Crimson incarnation — and it would be rash and silly to expect such an incarnation deliver anything better than these results.