Musicians genuinely considered to join King Crimson, with reliable sources

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by mcnpauls, Apr 9, 2020.

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  1. mcnpauls

    mcnpauls Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
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    From no less an authority than Fripp himself in an epic presentation/interview: we have the great man's comments that he suggested King Crimson could continue without him in 1974 by bringing back Ian McDonald and bringing in Steve Hackett to work with Jon Wetton and Bill Bruford. I am really intrigued by this idea and think it might have been a sensational band. Interestingly: Hackett would go on to work with Bruford when the latter becamse the live drummer for Genesis in 1976: Hackett also worked with McDonald and Wetton in his "Tokyo Tapes" Japanese gigs playing Genesis and King Crimson material


    Source - King Crimson - Sheer visceral power

    "Can King Crimson exist without Robert Fripp? When you stop performing, is that the end of the band?

    I've been trying to give King Crimson away to someone else for at least 45 years. Going back to 1974, when I was overwhelmed with the sheer terror and stupidity of the professional life in which I was involved, another direction was calling to me. However, at the same time, I felt responsible to the other members in the band, the roadies and the music. I'm sure the roadies could have got work with someone else, but nevertheless I felt a responsibility. So, what I did is I spoke to Ian McDonald, then living in New York, and asked him if he would be prepared to rejoin King Crimson. My thinking was that this would give a lineage from the first King Crimson, so that the projected next step in the band would have authority, and that it would be relatively straightforward. If King Crimson were to get another guitarist, Steve Hackett came to mind.

    I mentioned this idea to David Enthoven of E.G., and he said we're not interested in King Crimson without Robert. At that point, I called Bill Bruford and John Wetton, and said, “That's it.” Ian McDonald, according to a later interview I read, felt that I had deliberately asked him to join to wind him up in effect, and get revenge for him leaving in 1969. None of this was true. I had not asked him to join a new form of King Crimson, because it wasn't in existence, and I wouldn't have been a member of it if it had happened. I sought out the level of his interest so that I could then go to Bill, John and E.G. and say “Ian will join the band if you'd like to run with it.” But because David Enthoven said “No, we're not interested in King Crimson without Robert,” that was the end of it."
     
  2. Ray29

    Ray29 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Brooklyn, NY
    Interesting. But I could not imagine a King Crimson without Robert Fripp. Kind of like Dead and Company without Jerry Garcia.
     
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  3. aphexj

    aphexj Sound mind & body

    David Sylvian was approached to sing lead and declined... formed a duo with Fripp instead (which included future Krim Trey Gunn in the backup band)

    Early tryout rehearsal for what would become the Double Trio included drummer Jerry Marotta, also from the Fripp/Sylvian band

    Source In Their Own Words King Crimson 1995
     
    Last edited: Apr 9, 2020
  4. tug_of_war

    tug_of_war Unable to tolerate bass solos

    Really interesting. I didn't know these details about the band split in 1974. I agree with @Ray29, it would be strange to see King Crimson withou Fripp, but I must admit that Hackett would have been an appropriate substitute indeed.
     
  5. bRETT

    bRETT Senior Member

    Location:
    Boston MA
    Rick Kemp (Steeleye Span) was on bass for a very short time in 1971.
     
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  6. Chrome_Head

    Chrome_Head Planetary Resident

    Location:
    Los Angeles, CA.
    Crimson without Fripp is unimaginable to me, really. I'm glad he never left it to the side for very long.
     
  7. aphexj

    aphexj Sound mind & body

    It's not 100% certain to be him but I believe the long 'Blow' rehearsal tracks on the Sailors' Tales box set are his only recorded work with the band
     
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  8. mcnpauls

    mcnpauls Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    Europe
    Thanks, Aphexj: it's a fascinating set of insights into KC's return in the 90s, although it doesn't mention a KC invitation to Sylvain, but it does confirm that Jerry Marotta was seriously considered, but didn't make the cut:

    An aborted rehearsal with Jerry Marotta

    (Gunn) I could tell Adrian was going along with Robert’s idea but not wholly into it, and that night I think I saw Robert the most distressed I’ve ever seen him in his life; he was like, ‘it’s not working’.”

    (Mastelotto) “Robert said that things hadn't worked out with Jerry and that he'd had a vision of using two drummers: ‘It'd be you and Bill Bruford’. I said, 'What does Bill think about this?' and he replied 'I don't know. I haven't called him yet. I called you first’.”
     
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  9. mcnpauls

    mcnpauls Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    Europe
    Confirmation from King Crimson's own website that Michael Tippett and his then wife Julie Driscoll were simultaneously invited to join the band by Fripp before "Lizard":

    Source Happy Birthday Lizard

    Fripp’s desire to traverse that abyss and his commitment to finding a freer rock and jazz vocabulary to could be measured by the increased involvement of Keith Tippett in Crimson recordings. Having made no secret of his admiration of Tippett’s music, Fripp formally asked the pianist, along with his wife, Julie Tippetts (nee Driscoll) to not only join the band on a permanent basis but become an equal partner in determining musical direction. "The terms would have been that I would have had musical input. He knew that I was a strong musical personality and I would have gone in and possibly taken it all in another way with his blessing because we would have been joint bandleaders," recalls Tippett. Though tempted the pianist declined. "I hadn’t long been in London and I’d left Bristol realising that I had to go to London to play with musicians who were more experienced than myself to learn quickly — apart from that I had too much love for the sextet and it would have taken me away from the jazz scene”.
     
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  10. mcnpauls

    mcnpauls Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
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    Confirmation from King Crimson's own website that Rick Kemp was invited to join the band by Fripp and Mel Collins before "Islands":

    Source: All About Sailors' Tales

    Kemp impressed Fripp and Collins enough to receive an invite to join the band. He accepted, but changed his mind two weeks later, believing himself to not be up to the level of the rest of his Crimson band mates. While he'd decided, in fact, to retire from music, he was already an in-demand session player and, just a year later, was asked to join British folk rock band Steeleye Span...and, once again, the rest is...

    A David Singleton article at the same 0fficial KC/Fripp site confirms this offer:

    Source Islands - The Long View

    After months of struggle, the new Crimson line-up at last took shape when newly recruited singer Boz Burrell took up a bass guitar that had been left behind by Rick Kemp who had quit KC to join Steeleye Span.
     
    Last edited: Apr 9, 2020
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  11. mbd40

    mbd40 Steely Dan Fan

    Location:
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    King Crimson without Robert Fripp would be like the Fall without Mark E. Smith. It's weird to even think about.
     
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  12. mcnpauls

    mcnpauls Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    Europe
    Amazingly, Fripp had already considered a King Crimson without him in 1969:

    Source - Fripp's own article at the band/his official site:
    King Crimson 1969 - A Personal Throughview From The Guitarist.

    The musicians came together out of Giles, Giles & Fripp during the second half of November 1968. Only one person changed: Greg Lake replaced Peter Giles. I saw myself heading in a different musical direction to Peter, a superb bass player, and gave Ian and Michael a choice. Greg was a singer, and both lead and bass guitarist. I suggested he could replace Peter or myself.
     
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  13. Chrome_Head

    Chrome_Head Planetary Resident

    Location:
    Los Angeles, CA.
    Ian and Michael made a great choice, leaving to make their own record while Fripp and Lake stayed with Crimson. I almost wish Lake had stayed through Lizard and Islands, but the former at least possibly wouldn't have been as weird as it turned out with Lake on vocals.
     
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  14. aphexj

    aphexj Sound mind & body

    Whoops, I thought that was included in the essay. Sylvian himself did confirm it in 1994 in an interview with Sound on Sound magazine's Paul Tingen:
    David Sylvian: Recording Tin Drum & The First Day

     
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  15. mcnpauls

    mcnpauls Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    Europe
    You are a gem! Thank you!
     
  16. curbach

    curbach Some guy on the internet

    Location:
    The ATX
    I seem to recall reading somewhere that Elton John was considered for the band in the early days, but I cannot recall where.

    Did Fripp ever ask Daryl Hall to join?
     
  17. aphexj

    aphexj Sound mind & body

    The band's manager Mark Fenwick booked a session for Elton to sing overdubs in the studio while they were recording Poseidon, but Fripp rejected the idea after hearing Empty Sky and the session was cancelled (though Elton still got paid). This story is in the Sailors' Tales book, and the Sid Smith biography as well
     
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  18. Humbuster

    Humbuster Staff Emeritus

    I love the current iteration of the band, but would love to see Ian back.

    FWIW, his “Drivers Eyes” album is superb.
     
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  19. SurrealCereal

    SurrealCereal Forum Resident

    Location:
    California
    I haven’t heard one way or another about that but if it’s just pure speculation then I would doubt it. Fripp didn’t seem to have any intention of reforming King Crimson around the time he was working with Daryl Hall. I read somewhere that Bruford and Wetton asked for a reunion around that same time and that Fripp’s refusal is what led to the formation of UK. Even the 1980’s King Crimson wasn’t intended as a “reunion” until after they had already formed.
     
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  20. Excerpt from Daryl Hall - Sacred Songs Wikipedia.

    "Upon release, Sacred Songs peaked at #58 on the Billboard Pop Albums chart; however, there was no hit single from the record.

    Afterwards, Hall recorded vocals for most of the tracks on Fripp's solo debut, Exposure (1979), however due to pressure from RCA and Hall's management this was cut back to just two songs on the final release ("You Burn Me up I'm a Cigarette" and "North Star"). These are included on some CD versions of Sacred Songs. Nearly thirty years after Hall recorded these songs, most were finally released on the 2006 re-issue of Exposure (1979) by Fripp's Discipline Global Mobile label. In notes for the 1999 Buddha Records CD reissue, Fripp describes Hall as the best all-around singer he'd ever met and speculates that had Sacred Songs been released as planned in 1977 at the height of the punk rock zeitgeist, music fans and critics might have seen Hall not only as a good R&B and pop singer, but rather as a creative innovator comparable to iconic British singer David Bowie.[2]

    Fripp and Hall considered forming a full-time band together with bassist Tony Levin and drummer Jerry Marotta, but only Levin stayed while Adrian Belew and Bill Bruford replaced Hall and Marotta, respectively. The group was originally planned to use the name Discipline, but gradually morphed into the Mark IV version of King Crimson.[2]"

    The Trilogy (Daryl Hall - Sacred Songs, Peter Gabriel - Peter Gabriel 2 (Scratch), Robert Fripp - Exposure)
     
    Last edited: Apr 10, 2020
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  21. Mirror Image

    Mirror Image 200 Years Of Anton Bruckner

    Location:
    United States
    To use a cliched analogy, it’d be like not having Lennon or McCartney in The Beatles. It just wouldn’t be the same nor would it make any sense.
     
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  22. Mirror Image

    Mirror Image 200 Years Of Anton Bruckner

    Location:
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    Also, it was to Belew’s begging that Fripp call this band King Crimson instead of Discipline, because Belew felt the King Crimson name had more weight and people knew the name better than some group with a different name. Turns out he was right.
     
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  23. Chrome_Head

    Chrome_Head Planetary Resident

    Location:
    Los Angeles, CA.
    Which is significant seeing as how Fripp has never sang a note on record in his life. As Fripp himself put it at one time, Crimson is "a way of doing things".
     
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  24. Mirror Image

    Mirror Image 200 Years Of Anton Bruckner

    Location:
    United States
    That’s right and Fripp, of course, has no reason to sing. His guitar playing does plenty of that already. :)
     
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  25. aphexj

    aphexj Sound mind & body

    This is misleading. After Fripp scrapped the idea of performing in a group with Hall (sometime in the late 70s while Sacred Songs was in record company development hell), he went back to England and formed The League of Gentlemen in 1980. There was no continuity between the planned Fripp/Hall band and Discipline — Tony Levin did not "stay" in the band while the other two positions changed. Discipline was formed from the nucleus of Fripp, Bruford, and Belew, as the source Wikipedia cites explains.

    They auditioned bass players and selected Levin for the position. Eric Tamm sez:
    They performed several dates in the UK under the name Discipline before changing it to King Crimson. So it's not exactly right to say Hall was a contender for Crimson, the collaboration with him and Fripp was years in the past by that point
     
    Last edited: Apr 10, 2020
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