With ZZ Top opening the show and Golden Earring headlining, King Crimson’s rocker-on-steroids, The Great Deceiver quickly establishes that this isn’t quite your regular rock ‘n’ roll. The abrupt switch between that almost punkish staccato attack to Lament’s more genteel introduction must have had more than a few heads turned. Fripp notes in his dairy at the time that the band received a polite reception for their trouble but if you listen to the cheers and applause after a very strong reading of Exiles, the punters seemed to have come round to the Crim way of doing things.
Easy Money continues the high energy approach with the intro to the guitar solo being extremely powerful with Fripp’s lacerating solo scratching deep into the fretboard. The pace drops but only momentarily as Cross’ Mellotron flows and Fripp’s guitar goes from the reflective arpeggios of the album version to a screaming howl. Definitely one of the hardest-edged versions of this song you’re likely to hear.
And speaking of hard-edges, check out the instrumental section of Starless as Bruford takes the ball and runs with it. There’s a moment where he goes into an extended snare roll that leaves Fripp hitting that single note like he’s driving a piton into the side of a particularly precipitous cliff face. This is another remarkable rendition of Starless with the band bringing every last scrap of its considerable firepower to bear on an especially thrilling climax.
What is particularly upsetting about this gig is that as a truly savage Talking Drum is whipping up a frenzy and is just within a few beats away from the jump into LTIA Pt II, the audio goes dead. Has the tape run out? No. The venue receives a powercut. The cause of the cruel cut? Maurice Cloud,who was at the show reveals all: “Two give or take weeks later I learned from the owner of Independent Records that the cause of Crimson’s abbreviated appearance was a ZZ Top roadie pulling the plug on them.”
Please note that this concert was first released on CD as part of The Road To Red boxed set in 2013.
