#25 - In the Court of the Crimson King: King Crimson (1969)

King Crimson’s been here before. This cover, though, gives a much better feel for the band’s dark, edgy, and – honestly – somewhat lurid aspects.

The album also just so happened to be their debut, and was arguably the first real prog rock album out there. The hits are the title track (a favorite of the true burnouts at Gateway SHS in Monroeville PA in the mid 70s) and “20th Century Schizoid Man” (a particular favorite of former Prime Minister Tony Blair).

Blair was actually in a band called The Ugly Rumors

The latter song was also the inspiration behind the cover. It’s the work of Barry Godber, a computer programmer, though trained as an artist. He would die soon after its release, at age 24, of a heart attack.

This is his only credit, though he also did the inside cover. The inspiration for that? Why, the Crimson King himself, of course.

Where are they now? Well, Robert Fripp would be the only band member to remain with the band the whole time. He’s also known as one of the best and most innovative guitarist out there (Frippertronics, anyone?).

Though he could easily be mistaken for a bank vice president

Greg Lake would go on to form Emerson Lake and Palmer. Tragically, he would die only a couple of years ago, from cancer.

Later stage Elvis?

Ian McDonald would help form Foreigner. He’s done a lot of session work since then, including guitar, sax, keyboards, flute, and vibraphone.

Random older bloke down the pub?

Drummer Michael Giles? Well, he was just the drummer.

Keep on drummin’

And here they all are in younger days:

Fripp, Giles, Lake, McDonald, lyricist Peter Sinfield

Here are a couple of more great King Crimson covers, all by artist P.J. Crook:

Some more of her very dream-like work:

And of course some parodies/homages of that original as well:

In fact, the thing has become something of a meme:

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