Errors-To: admin at elephant-talk dot com Reply-To: newsletter at elephant-talk dot com Sender: moderator at elephant-talk dot com Precedence: bulk From: moderator at elephant-talk dot com To: newsletter at elephant-talk dot com Subject: Elephant Talk #857 E L E P H A N T T A L K The Internet newsletter for Robert Fripp and King Crimson enthusiasts Number 857 Monday, 9 July 2001 Today's Topics: Metamorphosis Re: Tool inspired by KC inspired by Tool? Dragon Cover? Tool/Grooves Connection KCCClub releases mastered at the wrong speed? Re: LP trivia 21st Century KC logo ------------------ A D M I N I S T R I V I A --------------------- POSTS: Please send all posts to newsletter at elephant-talk dot com To UNSUBSCRIBE, or to CHANGE ADDRESS: Send a message with a body of HELP to admin at elephant-talk dot com or use the DIY list machine at http://www.elephant-talk.com/list/ To ASK FOR HELP about your ET subscription: Send a message to: help at elephant-talk dot com ET Web: http://www.elephant-talk.com/ Read the ET FAQ before you post a question at http://www.elephant-talk.com/faq.htm Current TOUR DATES info can always be found at http://www.elephant-talk.com/gigs/tourdates.shtml You can read the most recent seven editions of ET at http://www.elephant-talk.com/newsletter.htm THE ET TEAM: Toby Howard (Moderator), Dan Kirkdorffer (Webmaster) Mike Dickson (List Admin), and a cast of thousands. The views expressed herein are those of the individual authors. ET is produced using John Relph's Digest system v3.7b (relph at sgi dot com). ------------------ A I V I R T S I N I M D A --------------------- Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2001 18:22:26 -0500 From: "lmckee.tn" Subject: Metamorphosis I have been trying to purchase Metamorphosis, but I am not having any luck finding it. Is there anyone interested in making a trade of some sort for a copy of it? Please reply to my private email address mailto:lmckee dot tn at netzero dot net Thanks ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2001 19:38:31 -0500 From: "Grant Colburn" Subject: Re: Tool inspired by KC inspired by Tool? Sam wrote: "I keep reading that the latest Tool shows "obvious" inspiration from King Crimson. Am I listening to the same CD as the folks making such a suggestion?" If its called Lateralus, yes! "Most of the guitar work sounds like so much death head banging chords." Actually I would say that Tool's guitar player is not overly influenced by the guitar playing of Fripp. Its more in how the music is at times constructed in its use of odd meter rhythmic patterns. "The drumming is heavily based on bass drum and what sounds like large mallet drumming." Actually what you are hearing is probably a "wet dream" to Mr. Fripp. Its not mallets so much as it is the sound largely of drums with NO CYMBALS. Danny Carey seems to be a master of knowing how to use cymbals for effect rather than a constant cloud of white noise which obliterates all other sound. "The singing is largely unvarying and the lyrics are hard to make out." I've gotta disagree with you there. Yes, the lyrics are hard to make out at times (at least regarding what they actually mean), but the singing is anything but unvarying. I'd go so far as to say that they are probably some of the most well thought out and complex melodies one is likely to hear on an album that just went platinum. If it sounds unvarying its because you haven't listened to it enough.... "I can't make out any musical association." (between Tool and Crimson)" The big association is in the rhythmic complexity of what they do. The opening of the second full song Patient for me has the most obvious KC reference. Its main pattern riff is in 5 (which most of the album is by the way), but what they do that's so Crimson-y is take a 5/8 pattern and have the drums play a 5/4 half time pattern over the top so that the 5/8 pattern starts over half way through the drum pattern. This is a TOTALLY Crimson idea used particularly in the verses of Frame by Frame where they set up a similar groove of 7/8 patterns over 7/4 half time drums. That and they are also beginning to make use of the different members playing in different time signatures at the same time idea. Its just done in giant loud metal music! "Further suggestions that KC might in turn be inspired by Tool make me wonder how that might happen musically." I think its the overall power and possibly the tribalness of Tool that Fripp may be inspired by. It may even be the appeal they generate even WITH releasing an album of VERY long songs based in odd time signatures. I think he admires the complete package. "Now, Fripp has indicated his liking the previous Tool CD (I've yet to read about how he feels about the latest one)." Well then you've gotta check out his commentary about going to see and hang out with Tool on his newest diary post. The biggest and most revealing quote from it to me is where he says (paraphrasing)that Tool is better at being Tool than Crimson is at being Crimson. "If Tool is being influenced by KC then great. I just don't hear the influence in their music, and I'm not sure KC would find much there musically in Tool's latest work worth building on either." Well, they are definitely influenced by KC but you can tell that Crimson is one of many influences put together to make music that is entirely Tool. Along with KC I hear at times the influence of Gabriel, especially from Passion. In particular the tribal drum loop that gets added to the end of the Grudge. It sounds directly inspired by the drums off the first track of Passion (and Security for that matter!) Unlike Crimson (but at times like Gabriel and world music) they often write to an underlying drone that also gives them their tribal quality. But they are definitely also from the metal/hard rock world in their riffs and dropped D tunings. The music doesn't harmonically move like KC, it doesn't really have the dissonant chords of Crimson, yet at the same time they are one of the most successful bands around where one can find definite King Crimson influences. Crimson knows it and Tool not only knows it, but continues to tell just about every interviewer they talk to about it. Really, if you are looking for a band with definite Crimson sound feel free to check out bands like Anekdoten. They often DO sound just like Crimson. The reason why Tool has been such a focus though is cuz they really are such a big successful band. Personally I don't want to hear a Crimson clone. If you can't handle the sound of metal, Tool probably won't ever be for you, but perhaps persevere and keep listening. If Fripp likes and admires it, there's gotta be something in it you're missing, eh? ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2001 21:38:38 -0400 From: David Vella Subject: Dragon Cover? Greetings Eletalkers... Clark Ray writes in #855: > A friend of mine was telling me about an album in the late 60s or early > 70s > by a band that she's pretty sure included Robert Fripp and Greg Lake. > She > thought it was King Crimson, but I know (or at least I think I do) all of > the early King Crimson album covers. She says the cover was of a dragon > and > in the dragon's mouth was a beautiful woman (possibly a girl). Do you > have > any idea what the album was and who it was by? Er, Yes. That would be "Still" (Manticore, 1973) by Pete Sinfield. The cover is a reproduction of a painting called "The Big Friend" by artist Sulamith Wulfing. It indeed depicts a girl (or young woman), comfortably resting in the mouth of a large lizard or dragon, with strands of her long diaphanous hair draped through the lizard's teeth like so much dental floss. Part of the appeal of the painting is the contrast between the apparently precarious situation the girl is in and the equally apparent utter calmness her demeanor exudes. The lizard is more her protector than a threat to her. Big Friend indeed. The cover art is reproduced on the CD (out on Voiceprint, 1993, available from DGM) version, called "Stillusion" which features two additional tracks not on the original. Greg Lake does appear on the album - on the title track. Besides Pete Sinfield & Greg Lake, there are several other King Crimson alumni on the album: Mel Collins, Keith Tippet, John Wetton & Ian Wallace. But no Robert Fripp AFAIK. This is an excellent album, IMHO. I've been waiting 28 years for the sequel, and haven't given up hope yet.... Cheers, David Vella ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 07 Jul 2001 02:03:17 -0000 From: "Jason Adams" Subject: Tool/Grooves Connection There's been some recent talk of the number of grooves per side on every piece of vinyl and some other discussion about Tool...now to connect the two...The vinyl release of Tool's first album (Opiate) has two grooves on the second side...how bout that? jay a. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 07 Jul 2001 00:09:10 -0500 From: "Gabriel Boehme" Subject: KCCClub releases mastered at the wrong speed? I'm just wondering if anyone out there with perfect pitch has noticed that Club #10 and (possibly) Club #16 have been mastered at the wrong speed? Club #10 (Live in Central Park, NYC 1974) was a quarter step flat throughout, which is why all the tempos are too slow. It bothered me so much that I had to use a sound editor to fix all the tracks and burn a new CD so I could *finally* listen to the concert without having the "perfect pitch meter" in my head go nuts. And now, from listening to the sound samples, it appears that Club #16 (Live in Berkeley, CA 1982) has been mastered a half step *sharp*, which is why the tempo of "Matte Kudasai" sounded so darn *fast*! To be sure that the pitch was indeed off, I double-checked by attempting to play along with the "Matte Kudasai" and "Neil and Jack and Me" sound excerpts on the Club #16 page. Sure enough, I had to play everything one fret higher than normal! I posted a slightly different version of this message to the DGM Guestbook a while back, and aside from one small peep on the subject I was slammed to the wall with the resounding silence that followed. I don't know why this wouldn't be a noteworthy subject, unless perhaps the GB'ers simply assumed I was criticizing Fripp/DGM/KCCC/whatever, and shunned me accordingly. For the record, I wasn't attempting to criticize anyone, I just wanted to make the folks at DGM aware of the issue, so it wouldn't happen again. The reason I hadn't brought it up before was because I'd simply assumed that Club #10's problem was a fluke, until I heard the sound samples from Club #16. Again, I'm not complaining about anything, I love the KCCClub, couldn't live without it, and anything they decide to release is perfectly fine by me. The pitch/tape speed thing only irritates me because a) I have perfect pitch, and b) it's such an easy problem to fix in the first place. I guess my follow-up questions would be: has anyone else noticed this? Does it matter to other listeners if these things aren't mastered at the speed that they were originally performed at? Does anyone besides us "perfect pitch" people really care? Or was my Club #10 disc a fluke? Perhaps Club #16 was mastered just fine, and the RealAudio sound samples are off-pitch for whatever strange reason? Quite puzzled, Gabriel ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 07 Jul 2001 08:03:06 -0400 From: Adam Aronson Subject: Re: LP trivia Adding to the LP groove discussion... In 1981 Rush released a promo-only 12" called Rush-ian Roulette that had (if I remember correctly) 3 tracks on each side each with their own groove. The idea being that the DJ would place the needle on the record and get a 'randomly' selected track. Adam ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 7 Jul 2001 14:57:57 +0200 From: "Andrzej" Subject: 21st Century KC logo ------------------------------ End of Elephant Talk Digest #857 ********************************