“How are you so far? Happy? Happy with what you have to be happy with?” Belew asks these questions after a stomping Facts Of Life. For the audience, this show under the open skies of Florence is going well. On stage, in addition to having to actually play the material the performers have to also navigate their way around various equipment malfunctions, momentary clams where finger or foot is in the right place at the wrong time, and other external factors.
For example, in the first three numbers, Fripp’s sightlines are compromised by the distracting stare of a security guard whose gaze is fixed firmly in the direction of the guitarist. “When, eventually, he was persuaded to maintain security elsewhere, I was free to turn my fuller attention to the more musical aspects of performance,” Fripp noted in his diary at the time. Of course, there’s a rich irony in a person who is notionally there to safeguard the performance area ending up undermining it.]
Regardless of such issues, Larks’ Tongues IV here is on lethal form and Gunn’s solo on Thrush is a gem. That said, spare a thought for Fripp who notes, “my left foot continues to be mainly a numb experience, distant from the sensation of experiencing the presence of organic life within the human animal. Despite this, it is responsible for managing dual stereo volume pedals while the operator has almost no physical contact with the operation. Yow! as quadrophonic strings are asked to crescendo and diminuendo.”
