King Crimson
Islands

At the time of their fourth album, the king was experiencing one of the highest peaks of their sonic expressionism, despite Fripp's usual lineup changes.

The King Crimson had just released the masterpiece "Lizard," a difficult and evocative, avant-garde and dazzling album. A year has passed, and Robert Fripp, his guitar, and his mellotron are joined by Mel Collins (winds), Boz Burrel (bass, vocals), Ian Wallace (drums), and the usual visionary poet Peter Sinfield handling the lyrics. Additionally, (as in the previous album) the lineup is accompanied by some English jazz musicians.

The resulting work, visionary and melancholic, is a dreamy and baroque-like jolt filled with romantic and intimate lyricism. With enveloping and heavy sounds, " Formentera Lady" proceeds slowly, enveloped in an exotic and disorienting wind framework. Burrel's voice hovers like a specter among the instrumental magic of the crimson king, at times decadent and narcotized, sometimes soft and ethereal, dreamy, and mystical. The rhythms become nervous, uneven, and fast as " Sailor's Tale" enters the scene, an instrumental piece immersed in a dark atmosphere with a progressive and elaborate structure that, through a frenetic crescendo, paints stormy scenarios perfect for Fripp's torrential guitar solos. The dark atmospheres also dominate " The Letters", an oneiric lament sublimated by Burrel's voice, which is afflicted and alluring, adorning the composition, dressed with unsettling instrumental awakenings, twisted in a fanciful course. The subsequent " Ladies Of The Road" surprises, not quite in line with the album's atmosphere, its light mood and carefree pace break the rhythm of the record, which immediately returns to its coordinates with " Prelude: Song Of The Gulls", Fripp's seagull song, a noble and ethereal classical instrumental impregnated with melancholic and serene atmospheres at the same time.

The album reaches its culmination with the title track, "Islands" a dreamy journey through splendid, bright melodies yet simultaneously sad and visionary. The band demonstrates an incredible inspiration and instrumental cohesion, and when, in the piece's finale, elevated by a mellotron carpet, a horn solo rests, the barrier between reality and dream is completely shattered.