King Crimson: Three Of A Perfect Pair (remaster)

[3-LockBox]

Well now, I finally have all three CDs from Crim's '80s line up. And the third one's definately weaker than the other two, as far as the whole album is concerned. Most of you know that Fripp split the LP into two halves, Left and Right. The left side is accessible, the right is excessive, in the words of Mr Fripp. This 30th anniversary issue includes 'the other side', which includes some 'new' material from that era.

Since most of you are familiar with this album already, there's no sense in giving it a song by song review. But I will say the the first four songs on this disc are very good music from that period, but might sound a tad dated now, compared to the first two albums, which don't sound dated at all. The rest is spotty at best. Industry and Sleepless both get the remix treatment. In fact, Sleepless gets way over done here, with remix resets by Tony Levin, Bob Clearmountain, and F. Kervorkian, all of which range from superfilous to over-rought. Levin's remix involves extra sound effects and a new bass track, Clearmountain's involves heavy processing like echo and reverb, mixing vocals way in the back ground. And of course the 'dance mix' sounds as trite as many of the dance resets of the period, complete with tape looping and extended intro and what-not. Industry is not so much remixed as it is just re-tried, with must have been considered to be the best version winding up on the album. This is what KC haters refer to as 'noise for the sake of noise'; I guess in '84 it might have sounded avante gard or something. Unless you're really nostalgic for this sort of extended remix treatment, don't bother re-buying this disc, unless you don't already have the original. Myself, I think including these remixes are a detractor for an already spotty release.

PS Not that I detest remixes (dance or otherwise), but few producers were really any good at it. One person comes to mind that was, Steven Hague (New Order, Erasure, Depesch Mode). Hague elivated the remix to art form in the mid to late '80s, being able to take another performer's material and alter it or add to it, and make his own statement without trouncing the original material or using it out of context. His remixes with newOrder were superb to point of being better than the original.

[Dusty Chalk]

Nice review. I completely agree with your assessment of the Sleepless remixes, which I've heard. Though I think you meant superfluous. But, whatever. It's like they just looped a couple sections where it made sense.

[-Jar-]

PS Not that I detest remixes (dance or otherwise), but few producers were really any good at it. One person comes to mind that was, Steven Hague (New Order, Erasure, Depesch Mode). Hague elivated the remix to art form in the mid to late '80s, being able to take another performer's material and alter it or add to it, and make his own statement without trouncing the original material or using it out of context. His remixes with newOrder were superb to point of being better than the original.

you're spot-on.. the remix of "The Perfect Kiss" ("Kiss of Death") is just killer... and pretty much all the other remixes on Disc 2 of Substance are awesome..

-jar