Islands - 1971
Personnel:
Robert Fripp - Guitar, Mellotron, Harmonium.
Boz Burrell - Bass, Lead Vocals.
Mel Collins - Flute, Saxophone, Backing Vocals.
Ian Wallace - Drums, Percussion, Backing Vocals.
Keith Tippet - Piano.
Robin Miller - Oboe.
Mark Charig - Cornet.
Harry Miller - Double Bass.
Paulina Lucas - Additional Vocals.
Peter Sinfield - Lyrics.
This is a good album, and it often gets way too much undeserved criticism... Nonetheless, for Crimson it is a step down... Haskell and McColloch were disatisfied with the overall result of Lizard, and they quickly bailed... Boz Burrell and Ian Wallace were quickly recruited, as well as double bass player Harry Miller and Paulina Lucas contributing her vocals on some tracks... This is notable for being the LAST Crimson album to feature the lyrics of Peter Sinfield, he would eventually team up with Emerson, Lake and Palmer as well as Italian prog band Premiata Forneria Marconi... Here the band experiement with even stronger elements of classical and chamber music, theres also a noticable amount of Bealtes and Moody Blues influence here, and a lot less guitar, with the drums and bass very low in the mix, a very unique Crimson album... Unfortunately, the production here is quite poor compared to the first 3 Crimson albums... Everything is at a much quieter volume... The bass is barely audible, this is primarly because Boz Burrell was not actually a bass player when production first began, instead, Fripp simply taught him how to play the instrument... Because of his obvious lack of skill, Islands lacks the complex rhythms and fills of Crimsons first 3 studio works, Burrell certainly was no Lake, Giles or Haskell on bass... Nonetheless his vocals (which are a bit similar to Lakes) hold out pretty well... Though they are very low in the mix here, due to the lo-fi production and heavy instrumentation... This is the worst Crimson album from the 70s era, but it still has some very strong pieces of work.
1. Formentera Lady: Opens with some lovely double bass, flute and piano work... Burrells gives his best Greg Lake impersonation here... A strange quiet piece, with Ian Anderson-esque flute and jazzy piano... And Lakes i mean erm Burrells soft spoken vocals contribute to the Moody Blues-like atmosphere... Nice instrumental at the end, with some tasteful sax work and opera singer Luca's eerie theramin-like soprano.
2. Sailor's Tale: A jazzy instrumental piece, with a lot of horns, distorted, arpeggio driven guitar and mellotron.. Some great fusion style improv here.
3. The Letters: A very complex piece that starts out extremely quietly with just Burrells vocals before building up into a brass and guitar driven metal workout, then it gets quiet again, with a Sax solo from Collins, then it gets all heavy again... Eventually leading to Burrells cries of love gone sour... A heavly improvised piece with rapidly changing dymanics and no consistant structure to speak of... A glimpse into Crimsons next album... Larks Tongue's In Aspic.
4. Ladies Of The Road: My favorite song on the album, a funky song that sounds like it could have very well been an outtake from The White Album... Great blues howling vocals from Burrell... A parody of standard blues rock, which tells of the relationship between a band and their groupies... Some really dirty saxophone playing here.
5. Prelude: Song Of The Gulls: A harmony of strings and flutes, this sounds like a geniune piece of Bach.... Wonderful track... Instead of a mellotron/sampler, a real symphony orchestra was brought in to record this one.
6. Islands: One of the albums strongest tracks, it's beautifully done... Some of Burrells best vocal work is here, his vocals here are a bit more distinct from his Lake-risms earlier on the album... Great calm piece with piano, flute and cornet among other things... A very medieval like piece, like Cadence & Cascade and Lady Of The Dancing Water.
The album ends with a minute of silence and two minutes of band members screwing around in the studio while the recorder was still on.
Again, a good album, not a great one... But it's worth checking out if you have already heard the rest of Crimsons 60s/70s output.