King Crimson, I Can Understand
Andrew Keeling has published an analysis of "In the Court of the Crimson King." Actually, he analyzed (analysed) the entire album, but I'm going to concentrate on his analysis of the title track.
The title piece of ITCOTCK was, according to Peter Sinfield (E-mail to Andrew Keeling, April 9, 2000), already written: 'a complete Dylanesque song that I had written both words and music for.' However Sinfield goes on to say that Ian McDonald rewrote the music to the words.
The words of 'Court' give us a glimpse into an ancient past. Not only do these words seem to touch on the mythical dimension - i.e. they contain references to archetypes such as the King, the Black Queen, the Witch and the Jester relating, perhaps, to the cover-painting of 'In the Wake of Poseidon' which also includes a music quotation from 'Court' itself in 'The Devil's Triangle' - but also project backwards to 'Moonchild' (the moon is now a 'prison moon'), and to 'I Talk to the Wind', in terms of the opposites 'sweet and the sour' mentioned in verse three. More than that is the relation 'Court' has to 'Schizoid Man': the lyrics of 'Court' seem to give us a picture of the ancient court of a despot, and each of the verses focus on a particular facet of this....
The music is presented in refrain (ritornello) and verse structure. It is, like 'Epitaph', also presented in a hymn-like form. Like the section 'Et Resurrexit' in J.S. Bach's Mass in B minor, the ritornello sections are set in D major, which corresponds to the sun-like character of some of the lyrics/words both in the Bach and King Crimson....The material of this consists of a complete melodic phrase set over the chords D major, C major and B major. Not only is the falling minor third motives of the previous pieces/songs recalled in this harmonic progression, but it is interesting in itself. The mellotron melody F#, F#, F#, F#, F#, G, E outlines a suspension with an echapee (escape note), but is also sequential in the melody over the second chord in bar 3 (E, F#, D#). To arrive back in D major there is a part chromatic ascent: B, C#, D#, E, E# (also a filled-in tritone) which is later picked up by the bass guitar at the end of the 'Fire Witch' section....
Verse 1...is in E minor/aeolian, although the guitar alludes to E minor/dorian....
'The Return of the Fire Witch': a 'fantasy' on the material of the Ritornello, using the chords from it and a mellotron line which is a melodic variant of the melody....This 'fantasy' anticiptes the flavour of some of the music from 'Birdman' on McDonald and Giles....
'Dance of the Puppets': three-part mellotron flute fantasy played mechanically and scherzando. Serves as a break to the gravitas, as well as being an influence on the Genesis-strand of 'progressive' rock music. Repeated three times. On the final repeat a low sustained line outlines the 5ths of the bass guitar part of 'Fire Witch'.
Ritornello: played six times. Huge series of countermelodies, extreme electric guitar distortion, organ glissandi etc....
All I can say is that "break to the gravitas" is an understatement. The modern equivalent would be Barney the Dinosaur performing solo in the middle of a Metallica concert. (Modern equivalent? I'm dating myself. No one's heard of Barney or Metallica today.)
Well, one can understand why someone would perform such an analysis of an early King Crimson album (and I only published brief excerpts; the actual analysis is much more detailed). Now think of someone on the complete opposite end of the spectrum. Yes, people, the Ramones are also being critically analyzed. Argh.
[OE UPDATE: Here's the text]
In this class we will examine how we make aesthetic judgments in the arts. Our focus in the course will be on the question of whether such terms as high and low culture have any fundamental meaning in the way we look at artistic value.....We will be looking at...the songs of DeBussy and the Ramones. A text on aesthetics will help guide our discussions....
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