On this date, January 13, 1969, the first incarnation of progressive rock pioneers King Crimson was formed in London. Consisting of guitarist Robert Fripp, drummer Mike Giles (both formerly in Giles, Giles & Fripp), multi-instrumentalist Ian McDonald, bassist Greg Lake and lyricist, light manager Pet Sinfield. The group’s base and rehearsal room through it’s history was in the basement of a Fulham Road coffeehouse. The band’s name was coined by Sinfield. At this point, keyboard/sax and flute player Ian McDonald was the group’s main composer, albeit with contributions from Lake and Fripp, while Sinfield wrote the lyrics, designed and operated the band’s stage lighting, being credited with “sounds and visions.” McDonald suggested the band purchase a Mellotron (a keyboard instrument that relied on tape loops to replicate different instruments) and they began using it to create an orchestral rock sound, inspired by the Moody Blues. Sinfield described Crimson thus: “If it sounded at all popular, it was out. So it had to be complicated, it had to be more expansive chords, it had to have strange influences. If it sounded, like, too simple, we’d make it more complicated, we’d play it in 7/8 or 5/8, just to show off”.
On this date, April 9, 1969, King Crimson made its live debut performance with a show at the Speakeasy in London.
King Crimson was key to the formation of early progressive rock, strongly influencing and altering the music of contemporaries such as Yes and Genesis. Their debut album, In the Court of the Crimson King (1969), remains their most successful and influential release, with its elements of jazz, classical and experimental music. Their success increased following an opening act performance for the Rolling Stones at Hyde Park, London, in 1969 before over 300,000 people. Their debut album, In the Court of the Crimson King, was released in October 1969 on Island Records. Fripp would later describe it as having been “an instant smash” and “New York’s acid album of 1970” (notwithstanding Fripp and Giles’ assertion that the band never used psychedelic drugs). The album received public compliments from Pete Townshend, the Who’s guitarist, who called the album “an uncanny masterpiece.”
While their original sound astounded contemporary audiences and critics, creative tensions were already developing within the band. Giles and McDonald, still striving to cope with King Crimson’s rapid success and the realities of touring life, became uneasy with the band’s direction. Although he was neither the dominant composer in the band nor the frontman, Fripp was very much the band’s driving force and spokesman, leading King Crimson into progressively darker and more intense musical areas. McDonald and Giles, now favouring a lighter and more romantic style of music, became increasingly uncomfortable with their position and resigned from the band during the US tour. Thus ended the first, and greatest, King Crimson lineup. Fripp would steer the ship from that point on with a revolving door of personnel.
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