Islands (1971)

Artist: King Crimson
Release Year: 1971

Rating: 7/10

Track Listing: 1) Formentera Lady; 2) Sailor's Tale; 3) The Letters; 4) Ladies of the Road; 5) Prelude: Song of the Gulls; 6) Islands.

It's always a strange moment when I remember that a full three of these six tracks include at least some rocking element; yet, the album as a whole has a heavy, sleepy quality that drags it down.  But, because this is King Crimson, the result of that dragging-down is still a very solid album.  

That sleepy sort of atmosphere is where "Formentera Lady" kicks things off, and although King Crimson have historically built those subtle, muttering vocal lines and tinkling piano cascades into something more substantial, here they opted to bring in some rather dissonant vocal chants from a certain Paulina Lucas, and doing that for another five minutes just doesn't work.  Interesting, though, that this is the only time you'll ever hear a woman on a King Crimson album.  At least Mel Collins ensures there's still a pulse the whole time.  

Fortunately, we soon awaken into the furious "Sailor's Tale".  This is a blazing instrumental that starts out portentous and tense before swiftly boiling over into frantic solos: first, the terrible rabid wail of Collins' saxophone, like the panicked screech of a wounded beast; then, a metallic, clanking guitar solo from Fripp, suggesting the rattling of a ship's lines in a violent storm; and finally, the Mellotron swells to engulf everything in the end, like the sinking of the Pequod.  Fantastic in theory, but...still, I can't help feeling like the sound and fury of this piece is still secondary to the desolate tapestry on which it appears.

"The Letters" is actually an incarnation of the old Giles, Giles, & Fripp song "Drop In", but with the old lyrics replaced with some tragic messages between a wife and a mistress.  That jump from the soft, wintery verse to the roaring instrumental is almost too jarring, but I guess in the context of the story it works.  But if it seems strange that Crim would do a love drama like this, just wait for "Ladies of the Road" and its nasty and licentious verses about "unzipping" feminists and fetishizing Chinese girls and everything else.  Ironically, for all the dumb, hypermasculine posturing of this song, I can't help but compare it to the Beatles.  The switch between 4/4 in the verses and 3/4 in the chorus is a mirror image of "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds", right down to the airy harmonies in the chorus that must have been a joke; meanwhile, the bass-driven shuffle of the verses harkens back to "Come Together".  At any rate, I still marvel both at Pete Sinfield writing these lyrics and at Fripp signing off on the song, but maybe he needed to humor Boz Burrell or something-- after all, the guy did go on to Bad Company almost immediately after this.

But if King Crimson could veer so far into pop rock melody and lecherous boasts, so could they run the other way into pure classical.  "Song of the Gulls" is not rock music in the slightest, but a string- and woodwind-laden lullaby.  It's a piece of real beauty for sure, but I'm still glad that this track only goes for a few minutes before we reach the title track.  For my money, this is not only the most underrated song of early King Crimson, but among their all-time best tracks.   The lyrics here are second to none, and Boz Burrell's thin, perishing vocal style is actually a perfect fit for those lines like "wreath snatch-hand briars, where owls know my eyes".  When we finally reach the ethereal chorus with its minimalistic, pitter-pattering keys, it's like we've really drifted away into a lonely, but heart-rendingly beautiful void.  "Infinite peace", indeed-- but is that a lonely peace, or a liberated one?  I say it's both, and it's brilliant.  When the brass solos kick in at the end, we're elevated into the sky and out into the cosmos, sailing right past the nebulae depicted on the cover art.  It's the feeling of a weary sort of personal triumph that no one else will ever know.

Overall, another impressive album for a band that was again on the brink of collapse.  It's just that the lifelessness pervades, to the point that the more energetic parts come off as exceptions and special allowances, always pulling back toward the slumbering norm.