Archive for Robert Fripp

Were Brian Eno and Robert Fripp The Artists Of The Year?

Posted in Music with tags , , , , , , on December 28, 2011 by johnbuckley100

Leica M9, 35mm Summilux, With Floating Element

It seems odd that so much of the music we listened to this year had one critical link in common: it made us think of Eno and Fripp.  Not in any general way, but specifically, as so many of the year’s best songs could be linked to something Eno produced with his chum long, long ago.

The pattern started early.  In January, when Wye Oak’s Civilian was released, the song we listened to the most was “The Altar” — which sounded like it was recorded about ten minutes after Fripp laid down his solo on Eno’s “St. Elmo’s Fire” on Another Green World.

We have loved albums by A.A. Bondy, Kurt Vile, and The War On Drugs — all of which seemed like they’d been recorded under the influence of, in particular, Eno and Fripp’s Evening Star.  It was as if the most familiar touchstone for ambient music was that one incredible moment when Eno and Fripp lulled away migraines with soft waves lapping from a placid sea.

Near the end of the year, we got into Atlas Sound, the highly interesting side-project by Deerhunter front man Bradford Cox.  His song “Doldrums” sounds like he just added vocals to a track laid down by his forebears.

Weird.  In a year notable for the originality of so many artists — White Denim, for example — all roads seem to lead back to Fripp and Eno.  It was as if Evening Star was the point to which all compasses were raised.

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Citay Updates Fripp and Eno For The Modern Age

Posted in Music with tags , , on July 11, 2010 by johnbuckley100

Just as the 1964 Worlds Fair seemed so spanking new in its evocation of the future, only to leave Queens with rusting metal and anachronistic architecture, there once was a time the coolest thing on Earth was the collaboration between Brian Eno and Robert Fripp.  That was a long time ago now, and though aspects of No Pussyfooting and Evening Star are every bit as relevant today as they were in the late ’70s, it does seem like these were remnants from a prior age.  You can still hear Eno’s mid-Seventies run of classic art-pop echoed in the choruses of the New Pornographers and likeminded archaeologists, but Fripp not so much.  Until we stumbled across the albums by San Francisco’s Citay.

Thanks again to Uncut‘s samplers, we’ve been playing Citay’s two albums — Dream Get Together and Little Kingdom — on airplane flights and mornings when we can wake up on our own terms (listening to music, not rushing to work), and they’re pretty great.  Not simply instrumentals like the Fripp-Eno collaborations, they’re more like Eno albums with a strong Fripp presence.  In some cases, the dual guitar figures become so baroque and intertwined, the music is too rich, like trying to subsist on a diet of chocolate cake.  But if you, like me, wish that Eno was still making pop records on his own, or collaborating with his crimson king pal, you’ll love these ‘uns.

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