A fan’s notes

Traveling to see the King

Because King Crimson fans will “travel” — which is to say they’ll happily drive 100 or 200 miles (or more) to see the band — several folks in The Day’s readership area will be heading to Manhattan tonight and/or Saturday to see the band at the Beacon Theater.

For many reasons, I won’t be at either performance, but I did see them last week at the Orpheum in Boston. It was, as has been the case each time I’ve experienced the various lineups of the Crim dating back to 1973, a transcendent experience: a two-hour sonic and visual assault that started with brooding, foaming energy and, in cumulative fashion, grew more bewitching and powerful until my mind, heart and ears felt like they were melting in some euphoric, alchemical fashion.

If you’re on the fence about whether to head to NYC, let me answer that for you: GO! GO NOW!

This tour is the most comprehensive KC junket maybe ever, as they’re playing rarely performed material from each distinct era of the band. There will be majestic, gorgeous melancholia — “Islands,” “Epitaph,” “Starless,” “Moonchild,” “In the Court of the Crimson King” — as well as arching, muscular excursions that stun and dazzle with melodic complexity such as “Discipline,” “Radical Action,” “21st Century Schizoid Man,” “Level Five,” “Easy Money,” “The ConstruKction of Light,” the first two parts of “Larks Tongues in Aspic,” and much more.

Througout history, various and occasionally perceptive people have believed music has the incantatory capacity to summon the Divine. In that sense, this is the only band in the world of whom I can say with more seriousness than I’m comfortable with: Watching King Crimson onstage is to witness an effort at dominion, and you start to believe they make the sort of music that could literally awaken ancient Gods.

The only folks not laughing at the above sentence are the people who’ve seen them.