February 18, 1972 - Detroit, MI - Cinderella Ballroom
“Thank you. Let’s try to settle down actually.” - Boz
Context
It’s a winter Friday night in Motown in 1972 and King Crimson’s come to town to warm the locals. King Crimson has been on the road in the U.S. for nearly a week now. They’re trudging in and out of vans in the wintry northeast. It’s a life of bad travel food, random and sketchy 70s lodging, cold wet air, hot radiator rooms, frigid basements, and bare stages. Each night a hall of fans equal parts fascinated, curious, and demanding awaits.
Some sources attribute this recording to Feb. 17 others to Feb. 19. Here I’m going with the Sailors’ Tales box set date of Feb 18.
Listening Notes
Pictures of a City
There’s a bit more of an audience participation sound on this recording. Some hooting and hollering near the stage that greets Pictures. I love Ian’s cymbal work here early. I can’t quite tell, but it seems as if they’re using the VCS3 on Boz’s vocal early here. It could also be recording distortion. The bass guitar washes away at the high volume levels making this a tough listen.
There’s a great frenzy breakdown right before the start of the second verse.
More great cymbal bell work in the syncopated running section of Pictures here. Coming through clearer here than in other recordings. Robert completely steps away during the jazzy breakdown section after the unison playing ceding the ground to Mel and the rest of the band.
Robert starts creeping back in as Mel’s solo builds in intensity. I love Boz’s warbling, meaty “Lost in Hell” closing lyric.
Formentera Lady
Boz complains of some strange feedback. Not as bad as Wilmington, but a bit of this feedback leaks through. I’m enjoying Boz’s vocal performance here. He’s breathing life into the lyric. Mel’s climbing all over him a bit with the flute playing.
The “Incense children dance to an Indian drum” lyric is met with a kind of generic faux-Native American tha-THUMP, tha-THUMP from Ian. The kind of thing that sounds like it emerges from the mind of someone who grew up watching cowboys and Indians shows. What a horror we’ve created that a throwaway musical statement presented in poor taste 50 years ago should live on for a fool like me to stand in judgement over.
What was I saying about Mel’s flute work? My goodness he does this dizzying swirling run before dropping perfectly into the melody over the chorus. Magical.
After the chorus Mel picks up the sax and we begin jamming. I like how Ian grows his part out of the da-DUM beat of the main composition and then brings it back again. Clearly playing along with Boz. Now Ian’s laying on this snare shuffle and the whole band is grooving and comping to it.
My goodness … the joy of this band is it is a Mel Collins showcase. He’s going into a frenzy. But things seem to peter out a bit before Ian ushers us in to…
Sailor’s Tale
Kind of a mad dash through the opening composition until we get this evil, other-worldly solo from Fripp just going all out with the hammer-ons layered with some sustain. Oooohhh… and then we get a take at the signature slashing solo to Sailor’s. I think this is the first recording of this leg of the tour where he actually relies on this for the Sailor’s solo even though it’s such a defining aspect of the studio performance and the live performances of the piece 40+ years later.
Cirkus
After Boz introduces the song he continues to complain of “strange things happening up here. All kinds of shocks and buzzing.”
Perhaps this explains why this piece gets off to a decidedly sluggish start for a piece that this band already tends to treat sluggishly. Collins attempts to resurrect it with his sax voicings in the “lest the mirror stop turning” verse and what follows, but it all sounds a bit out of place.
“Elephants force fed on stale chalk”…. this section sounds like Boz is reading off of a menu. The building mellotrons are completely over-driven in the recording, but I think there’s a chance it may have sounded great in the hall.
Ladies of the Road
Fripp gets a dose of the electric shocks that Boz has enjoyed all night as he introduces Ladies of the Road. Robert’s jazzy intro to this piece is always fun to listen to. And after the first verse we’re treated to a reliable gritty surf sax solo from Mel.
Boz really gets into it with the second verse. “All of you know the girls of the road are like feedback”
Fun to hear Robert play around with some muted plucked tones over the top of the last chorus. Boz is really screaming it out here. A man full of electric charge.
Groon
And we’re off into Groon. The head of the piece plays through quickly, but what comes after is a bit contemplative. No immediate groove comes out of Wallace. He and Fripp step back to let Collins do his thing with some gong-like bell notes from Burrell.
This is early Crimson ‘scapes.
Eventually Wallace starts to build a slow groove to bring the rest of the band along to meet up with Collins. I will never get tired of this jam. My goodness it gets the whole body moving.
I’m continually impressed by Wallace’s solos. Americans enjoy fireworks and this is a fireworks solo. There’s a wonderful snare para-diddle build up to the VCS3 synth getting introduced. The synth gets some cheers from the crowd. I assume that Wallace operates it on this tour but I’m not certain. Really hard to know whether this was mind-bending or campy to the audience. Probably depends on who you ask.
It’s really fun to hear the band re-emerge out of the rising synth spiral. The solo gets a rapturous applause and then straight in to…
21st Century Schizoid Man
An as usual stunner… as it transitions into Fripp’s solo space it’s fun to listen to Wallace play around with his part and play to Fripp. Wallace’s control of the pace and dynamic here is a joy to listen to. Robert hands over the solo territory to Mel who gives the jam a bit of a reset. Wallace and Burrell sync back up. Wallace tunes into the groove that Boz is playing around with while Mel blows away. It sounds like they run over the allotted jam section and Fripp cues in the running synchronized lines, kind of reining the beast back in, and being a bit of a party killjoy.
Mel adds a little dazzle and mania on top of the the final verse which is just a fantastic touch!
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