Earthbound (King Crimson album)

Earthbound
Live album by King Crimson
Released 9 June 1972
Recorded 11 February – 10 March 1972
Genre Progressive rock, jazz fusion
Length 46:38
Label Island
Polydor Records
E.G. Records
Virgin Records
Producer Robert Fripp
King Crimson chronology

Islands
(1971)
Earthbound
(1972)
Larks' Tongues in Aspic
(1973)
Professional ratings
Review scores
Source Rating
Allmusic [1]

Earthbound is a live album by the band King Crimson, released in 1972 as a budget record shortly after the line-up that recorded it had broken up. It contains the band's first official live release of their signature song "21st Century Schizoid Man," and an extended live version of their 1970 non-LP b-side "Groon." It also contains two improvised tracks with scat vocals from Boz Burrell.

The album's sound quality is very poor, because of its being recorded onto cassette tape (a low-fidelity recording medium by 1972 standards) by live sound engineer Hunter MacDonald. The liner notes to recent CD reissues of the album state that it was "captured live on an Ampex stereo cassette fed from a Kelsey Morris custom built mixer ... in the rain from the back of a Volkswagen truck." Atlantic Records, King Crimson's original North American distributor, declined release of Earthbound because of its poor sound engineering. Because of its cassette origins, the sound could not be significantly improved on later CD reissues of the album.

Track listing

Side one
No. TitleWriters Length
1. "21st Century Schizoid Man" (including "Mirrors")  (Recorded at the Armoury, Wilmington, Delaware, United States, 11 February 1972)Fripp, Michael Giles, Greg Lake, Ian McDonald, Peter Sinfield 11:45
2. "Peoria" (Recorded at The Barn, Peoria, Illinois, United States, 10 March 1972)Boz Burrell, Mel Collins, Fripp, Ian Wallace 7:30
3. "Sailor's Tale" (instrumental)  (Recorded at the Baseball Park, Jacksonville, Florida, United States, 26 February 1972)Fripp 4:45
Side two
No. TitleWriters Length
4. "Earthbound" (instrumental)  (Recorded at Kemp Coliseum, Orlando, Florida, United States, 27 February 1972)Burrell, Collins, Fripp, Wallace 6:08
5. "Groon" (instrumental)  (Recorded at the Armoury, Wilmington, Delaware, United States, 11 February 1972)Fripp 15:30

Personnel

King Crimson
Additional personnel

External links

References

  1. Eder, Bruce (2011). "Earthbound - King Crimson | AllMusic". allmusic.com. Retrieved 28 June 2011.