It’s been 42 years since Armored Saint came together and then shortly thereafter released their self-titled EP on Metal Blade Records just a year later. If you’re looking for a classic heavy metal band with pretty much all of their original members intact, look no further than Armored Saint. At present, the group includes founding members John Bush (vocals), Phil Sandoval (guitars), Joey Vera (bass), Gonzo Sandoval (drums), and mainstay Jeff Duncan (guitars).
Photo credit to Travis Shinn
Their tour technically started with the sold out Monsters Of Rock Cruise at the beginning of March, but the rest of the shows on land start on March 27th in Anaheim including multiple Armored Saint headlining shows during their days off on the Queensrÿche run.
For those not paying attention, the band has been writing a new album as the follow-up to their fabulous ‘Punching The Sky’ record released back in October 2020. A hit on several different radio charts, the album showcases a band whose formula never gets tired, dated, nor derivative. Highlights include the album opener, “Standing On The Shoulders Of Giants,” “Lone Wolf,”, and the highly infectious “End Of The Attention Span.”
For those who’ve been following the band since the early 80’s, it comes as no surprise that the Sandoval brothers are playing in fine form while anchored by bassist Joey Vera (who also recently exited Mercyful Fate). Singer John Bush hasn’t lost a step either as evidenced on songs like fan favorites “Unfair” and “Never You Fret,” both of which feature some killer fretwork by Jeff Duncan and Phil Sandoval.
Said vocalist John Bush about the upcoming tour, “We are happy to announce that we will be hitting the road again in March 2024 to team up with our good friends and one amazing band, the mighty Queensrÿche! The tour hits lots of cities we haven’t played in a while including dates in Canada! Come on out and watch two classic metal bands bring the house down every night!”
Armored Saint, Queensrÿche and Strike Force play Ace Of Spades located at 1417 R Street in downtown Sacramento. Tickets are $53 advance can be purchased here at aceofspades.com. Doors open at 6:30pm and the show starts at 7:30pm. All ages are welcome.
Since forming 14 years ago, Gloryhammer have been flying the flag for British heavy metal wearing armour and costumes on stage showcasing their own made-up characters. ‘Tales From The Kingdom Of Fife’ was the first record issued on powerhouse metal label, Napalm Records, which quickly grew them a loyal fan-base both on US soil and abroad. Now a veritable headliner in the US, Gloryhammer’s latest tour kicked off on March 7th in New York and will inevitably end on March 30th in Dallas, Texas.
Photo credit to Fernando Bonenfant
Although nowhere as prolific as their adoring fans would like, the group have managed to release 4 full-lengths. During that time, the band also landed some high-profile support slots on tours with power metal heavyweights Stratovarius, Blind Guardian and HammerFall. ‘Return to the Kingdom of Fife’ was released back in June 2023 and is propelled by standout tracks such as “Holy Flaming Hammer of Unholy Cosmic Frost,” “Wasteland Warriors Hoots Patrol,” and fan favorite “Keeper of the Celestial Flame of Abernethy,” all of which recall the best moments of Blind Guardian, Helloween, Gamma Ray, and Dragonforce.
Said the band about their latest video single, “For many years now, the Top Gun soundtrack, and in particular, Cheap Trick’s standout track ‘Mighty Wings’ has been a constant in our lives – the eagle-eared amongst you shall have heard it countless times in our pre-show playlist. When recording ‘Return to the Kingdom of Fife’ last winter, we decided to pay homage to the song that defined so many great moments for us by recording our own, distinctly Gloryhammer cover version.”
At present, Gloryhammer’s personnel list includes founding / original members Christopher Bowes aka Zargothrax (keyboards), Ben Turk aka Ralathor (drums), Paul Templing aka Ser Proletius (guitars), and James Cartwright (The Hootsman (bass) along with mainstay Michael Barber aka Zargothrax (keyboards) and newest member Michael aka Angus McFife (lead vocals).
The UK’s own Gloryhammer headline a night of power metal at Goldfield Trading Post located at 238 Vernon Street in Roseville. Also on the bill is Twilight Force and Rimron The Mighty Soothsayer. Doors open at 6pm and the show kicks off promptly at 7pm. Tickets can be purchased in advance for $30 here at goldfieldtradingpost.com. All ages are welcome.
It’s hard to believe that progressive/folk rock band Jethro Tull started 57 years ago. Although the group’s most important and longest-running contributor, Martin Barre, would join forces with singer/bandleader Ian Anderson just a year later, it’s important not to understate his relevance in the annals of classic rock history.
And while the name Jethro Tull means something entirely different to longtime fans today, with only original member Anderson at the helm, Barre’s live shows are a better representation of the music fans most want to hear. His current run of shows will celebrate the music he and Ian collaborated on that provided the soundtrack for many generations. The 77-year-old guitarist is still very much a live force, and his ferocious live band is a wonderful interpreter of the Jethro Tull catalog fans have come to know and love.
We caught up with Barre as he was preparing for his run of US shows.
Bohemian: Your run with Jethro Tull lasted 43 years and longer than any other member besides Ian. Are there any periods or records you enjoyed more than others?
Martin Barre: The early years were so exciting for all of us. We shared a common journey of travel, learning to be better musicians and performers, and were living on the road as a single unit. The many countries we visited were very open to new music, so we had a fantastic reception wherever we played.
Bohemian: Jethro Tull played all over the place during its formative years. What was the longest tour you’ve done to date?
Martin Barre: We would be on the road for 3 months plus, but we were also single, didn’t have roots in any country, and were so eager to travel and spread the music of Tull in new territories. Essentially the life of a musician is nomadic by nature, so we never thought about putting down roots. Because of that, we could play and record anywhere.
Bohemian: Although Tull’s songs were primarily written by Ian Anderson, did he have much influence on your solos and additional guitar licks on any give song?
Martin Barre: I had carte blanche with my guitar parts and, in particular, my solos. Rarely Ian would have an idea, but we would use it if it worked, of course. There was never an issue with egos. We all had a job to do and we all had a voice to be heard. Input, musically speaking, was always welcomed by all members.
Bohemian: You’ve been quite prolific as a solo artist. Do you have plans for a new record in 2024?
Martin Barre: My band tours continually, and this puts recording on the sidelines as it is so time-consuming. I have a lot of ideas “on tape,” but I will start fresh as soon as I can put aside the time for a new recording. I will have to consciously hold back on live gigs.
Bohemian: Do you and Ian ever talk about playing together again? It’s been 13 years since the dissolution.
Martin Barre: That’s really a question for Ian. There is no communication between us.
Bohemian: Is the upcoming show featuring only Tull music or will we hear some solo material?
Martin Barre: I always try and include my solo material and am so pleased that the audience recognizes it. The show is a history of Tull’s music so I am quite focused on that. However, I will always throw in a curve ball for the hell of it.
Martin Barre plays Sunday, March 17 at Blue Note located at 1030 Main Street in Napa. Doors open at 5pm and the evening-with show starts at 6:30pm. Tickets range from $49 to $89 advance and can be purchased at www.bluenotejazz.com. Ages 8 and over are welcome.
It’s no great secret that Brazilian communities are growing in the Sacramento Valley and surrounding areas. Yet some say there’s been a drought when it comes to heritage Brazilian acts performing in these parts: The Grupo Corpo dance company’s upcoming show at the Mondavi Center looks to fill some of that void.
Originally founded by choreographers Paulo and Rodrigo Pederneiras, the company combines aspects of modern dance with elements of Afro-Brazilian movment that are steeped in the history and free spirit of Brazil.
Attendees can expect a two-part show: The first and newer 2022 piece is titled ’Gil Refazendo’ and showcases the music of Brazilian musical legend Gilberto Gil. This will include performers draped in linen while the sounds play before a massive screen featuring ever-changing background images of sunflowers that seemingly rise up from their roots.
The second part of the night involves a seven-year-old composition titled ‘Gira,’ which takes a deep dive into the minutiae of Afro-Brazilian religions aided by the sounds of Brazilian jazz greats, Metá Metá.
Rodrigo Pederneiras will lead the attendees on a journey exhibiting parts of the lesser-known Candomblé and Umbanda rituals in dance.
For those fortunate enough to have already seen Grupo Corpo, they know what a force this dance troupe is when they performed the wholly different, but no less compelling ‘Seven or Eight Pieces for a Ballet’ and ‘Breu.’
Grupo Corpo performs Wednesday, March 13 at Jackson Hall located inside the Mondavi Center on the UC Davis campus at One Shields Avenue. Tickets start at just $30 with premier seating topping out at $79 and can be purchased in advance at www.mondaviarts.org. Doors open at 6:30pm and the show starts at 7:30 p.m. All ages are welcome.
It’s no great surprise that Altan, the first traditional Irish group signed to a major label, would want to kick off their run of shows in our fair city. Since The Sofia’s grand opening back in February 2018, Irish music and its many offshoots have been featured with increasing regularity at this mid-sized performing arts center and with favorable results. What starts in our fair city of Sacramento, Altan’s abbreviated run of shows will ultimately end just 19 days later in Chicago.
Considered one of the most important Irish bands of their time both at home and on US soil, the group has already collectively sold well over a million records. Additionally, they are a veritable headliner in the states drawing capacity crowds at performing arts centers, theatres, and major Irish-themed festivals.
With a brand new album set for release on Compass Records, the upcoming tour dates couldn’t have come at a more apropos time. Since forming back in 1987, the now 64-year-old Mairéad Ní Mhaonaigh (bandleader, lead vocalist, and fiddler) has helped lead the group to critical acclaim while releasing a formidable catalog. ‘Donegal’ is the group’s 10-track opus and steeped in the traditions of Irish culture while honoring their origins, the culture, and the fertile grounds from which they came.
On their latest record, the Altan collective also features fiddler/singer Clare Friel along with accordionist Martin Tourish. Guitarist Dáithí Sproul, guitarist/backup vocalist Mark Kelly, bouzouki, mandolin and Ciarán Curran.
‘Donegal’ kicks off in fine form with “The Yellow Tinker,” a beautiful and contemplative instrumental reel that forays beautifully into “Liostáil mé le Sáirsint,” which finds Ní Mhaonaigh at home singing in her native Irish language. Other highlights include the also fabulous reel, “An Gasúr Dána/An Ghirseach Dholba/ Ríl na mBreac Beadaí” and the ready-for-Irish-dance-competition jig, “Port Árainn Mhór/Port Kitty Rua Mooney.”
For those on the fence about Irish music in general, you are hereby advised to add the upcoming Altan concert to your to-do list. If there were ever a perfect entry point into world music in general, this would be it.
Altan plays The Sofia located at 2700 Capitol Avenue in downtown Sacramento. Doors open at 6pm and the show starts at 7pm. Tickets are $35. The Sofia is located at 2700 Capitol Avenue in downtown Sacramento. All ages are welcome.
Skeletal Remains turn the Arlene Francis Center into their own private boneyard on March 7. Photo by Allen Falcon.
Since forming in Southern California some 13 years ago, Whittier’s Skeletal Remains have produced some of the most forward-thinking death metal. With a discography that includes a handful of singles, one split, one compilation, and four full-lengths, this is one group that hasn’t sat idle waiting for things to happen.
At a time when most bands were sidelined by canceled Covid-related tours, the band used the downtime to their advantage, as well as time on the road in 2022 to hone their chops. The end result is the band’s fifth album and nine-track opus, the long-awaited ‘Fragments of the Ageless.’ As luck would have it, the new album will be available one day before its March 8 release date on Century Media Records at their sole Sonoma County show.
The band currently features sole founding member/guitarist/vocalist Chris Monroy, guitarist Mike De La O, drummer Pierce Williams (drums), and bassist Brian Rush. Said Monroy about the band’s work ethic and trademark sound, “With every record, we try to push ourselves to make a better record. We don’t get into, ‘We need to sound more like this or that.’ As death metal fans, we write what we enjoy and want to listen to.”
Fans of latter-day Cannibal Corpse, Hate Eternal, Sinister (from Holland), and Morbid Angel will be floored by standout tracks such as “Relentless Appetite,” “To Conquer the Devout,” and “Verminous Embodiment.” With breakneck speed double-bass, wonderfully sequenced lead guitar lines, and some of the most ferocious arrangements, it’s songs like “Unmerciful” with its myriad sections that separate Skeletal Remains from the rest of the stale death metal diaspora. Mixed and mastered by incomparable Swedish sensation Dan Swanö (Diablolical Masquerade, Asphyx, Incantation), the ends certainly justify the means.
For those fans lucky enough to catch them on a full-fledged US tour with Suffocation and Incantation last year, this local show is one of the few chances to see Skeletal Remains before they head overseas to play the Wacken (Germany) and Alcatraz (Belgium) festivals. There are only four scheduled shows celebrating the new record, including Santa Rosa, Los Angeles, Santa Ana, and Las Vegas, Nevada.
We caught up with Sonoma County’s own Brandon McCubbin aka Bitter End Booking who has been flying the flag for underground metal with great effect.
Bohemian: When did Bitter End Booking start?
Brandon McCubbin: I have been booking shows since 2015. However, I didn’t start doing it under the name Bitter End Booking until 2019. I took the name from the song “Bitter End” by my band Water Into Blood whom I write songs and play guitar in.
Brandon McCubbin’s Bitter End Booking has been promoting shows for nearly a decade.
Bohemian: How many shows have you done so far?
McCubbin: I have done about 100 shows to date.
Bohemian: Do you feel like Santa Rosa is becoming a major market for metal acts?
McCubbin: Santa Rosa is most definitely becoming a market for major acts. We’ve had bigger bands come through over the last 10 years but it started to die down a little bit before Covid hit. After Covid there wasn’t anyone bringing big bands anymore and I saw that as my window of opportunity to expand what had already been done here. Now, I am getting tours from agents all over the world.
Bohemian: Are you going to be doing more Neck Of The Woods shows or other Bay Area shows aside from Arlene Francis?
McCubbin: Yes, I am. I have already booked Bottom Of The Hill in SF along with Neck Of The Woods. I have a show at Brick And Mortar in May and a show in Morro Bay in July. I will continue to book in SF in the future but Santa Rosa is my home base.
Bohemian: What is the hardest part about promoting underground metal shows?
McCubbin: One of the hardest things about booking is avoiding booking shows on the same night as a similar event in the same area. When this happens, it splits the draw between both shows and both shows will have a smaller crowd than they could have had. To avoid this, I am always paying attention to other shows happening and regularly communicating with other bands/promoters.
Bitter End Booking presents Skeletal Remains with Morta Skuld (performing songs from their 1993 release, ‘Dying Remains’), Oxygen Destroyer, and Laceration at 7 pm, March 7 at The Arlene Francis Center located at 99 6th St., Santa Rosa. Tickets are $25 and can be purchased at the door or www.eventbrite.com. All ages are welcome.
Canada’s Voivod have enjoyed the kind of career most musical acts would envy. For the uninitiated, this Canadian quartet plays a heady blend of metal and punk with psychedelic overtones while employing both complex and odd arrangements. At present, Voivod is still led by founding members drummer / artist Michel Langevin aka Away and vocalist Denis Bélanger aka Snake along with guitarist Daniel Mongrain aka Chewy, and bassist Dominic Laroche aka Rocky.
Already huge influences on such disparate musical acts as Ryan Adams (he dedicated his album ‘Orion’ to late guitarist Dennis D’Amour), Tool, Soundgarden (band has dedicated songs to them and opened for them on their Louder Than Love tour), Mr. Bungle, Mastodon, Isis, Metallica, Dream Theater, Darkthrone, ALL, The Young Gods and countless others. They were also once hand-picked by Rush to open their Canadian dates and have headlined over Faith No More, Slayer, Exodus and many others.
Rather than being confined to one specific genre and struggling to come up with new and innovative ideas, the Voivod machine have always boldly broke musical boundaries with reckless aplomb. And while there were some obvious hiccups along the way – 1991’s ‘Angel Rat’ and 1993’s ‘The Outer Limits’ being the most obvious – it was those very musical choices which ultimately defined the band.
Their latest and 16th record, ‘Morgöth Tales,’ features 11 songs and should cater to longtime fans and newbies alike. Featuring 1 new song (title track), re-recorded versions of classics, and deeper Voivod cuts, their 2023 offering seems like the perfect promotional piece for a band who has successfully endured myriad musical landscape shifts.
Said singer Snake in an interview with The Moshville Times about the latest record and its inherent challenges, “It was really fun to do. First you realize how time flies, but for some of those songs it was like opening a treasure chest – they were buried for so long! There’s great memories of the first song that we ever recorded (“Condemned to the Gallows”) – I lost the lyrics! I was expecting someone on the internet might have them but I looked and there was nothing about that song. I was desperate because the music was already recorded and I was freaking out because on the original recording, I can’t hear what I was saying and I can’t recall what I was singing about because it was all screams and the definition is not really clear. I thought, “maybe my mum has it because she’s way more organized than I am”, so I called my sister and said, “can you go and see mum and see if she has…,” and I gave her the title. Then she called me back and said, “Yeah. It took two minutes to find it!” It’s like – file 36, second drawer and there you go! It was my handwriting – the only copy in the world!”
Their 42nd anniversary tour kicked off already in late February in Ohio and makes its way to the East Bay before finally winding down in late March in Pennsylvania. If their set list is any indicator, the upcoming show will feature songs both well-known and obscure with an emphasis on their ‘Nothingface’ record as well as earlier fare.
Voivod headline the UC Theatre located at 2036 University Avenue in Berkeley. Special guests include Prong, Hirax and Abominous: The Final Godsend. Doors open at 7pm and the show kicks off promptly at 8pm. Advance tickets are $35 and can be purchased here at theuctheatre.org. All ages are welcome.
Donell Jones cut his teeth writing music for other performers before releasing his debut in 1996. Bolstered by the single “In the Hood” and a well-received and thoughtful cover of Stevie Wonder’s “Knocks Me Off My Feet,” his first record, ‘My Heart,’ made its mark. Jones then became both a national and international sensation with the release of his sophomore album, ‘Where I Wanna Be,’ which made it into the Billboard Top 100 and peaked at #40.
Sacramento has always been a huge market for Jones, as evidenced by his record sales and strong attendance at shows. With a voice that is instantly recognizable, and a back catalog that has stood the test of time, Jones is still very much a live force. SN&R caught up with him in preparation for his run of shows.
SN&R: You released your first record at the ripe young age of 23. Were you ready for the reception you’d soon receive?
Donell Jones: I was definitely ready for the opportunity and for the world to hear me as an artist. I was already writing songs for Usher and Jade.
SN&R: Any advice for new R&B artists?
Jones: I’ve learned that you gotta have a strong team. No one can do it alone and you have to never stop ‘cause all it takes is one record. For anyone trying to to get in the business, the only thing I would say is practice and learn from the legends that came before you
SN&R: You put out your seventh full-length record – ‘100% Free’ – on your website for nothing. What was your rationale?
Jones: I released that album during the pandemic to give the world something from my heart that was free for everyone who wanted to listen. And that’s exactly what I did.
SN&R: What’s 2024 look like beyond this Sacramento show?
Jones: I plan to stay busy in 2024. I have a live band, but this Sacramento show is a track (pre-taped backing music) date.
SN&R: I worked for your distributor, BMG, when you released ‘Where I Wanna Be’ and we could barely keep that record in stock around the Sacramento valley. What do you remember about that tour on a national level?
Jones: That tour was amazing ‘cause I went out with Alicia Keys and when that album came out, “U Know What’s Up” took off. Having Left Eye (from TLC fame) on that record made it blow up even more. It stayed at Billboard Number 1 (on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart) for 8 weeks, so that was huge for me and my future career.
SN&R: Do you have new material that will make it into your set? Can we expect a little from each of your LaFace releases?
Jones: I try to sing a little bit of everything, but my time is limited on this show and I’m only doing the hits.
Dwight Murphy Presents hosts ‘A Night For Lovers’ featuring Joe, Donell Jones, Jacquees, Pleasure P, Case, Suice Da Connect, J. Holiday, and Adrian Marcel on Friday, March 1st at Sacramento Memorial Auditorium located at 1515 J Street in Sacramento. Tickets can be purchased at www.ticketmaster.com.
The Branford Marsalis Quartet is still a force on both in the studio and live front.
At present Marsalis is backed by pianist Joey Calderazzo, longtime bassist Eric Revis and drummer Justin Faulkner. As evidenced on recent songs, the quartet has become a well-oiled machine with a reverence for the jazz greats of yore. Anchored by the rhythm section of Revis and Faulker, it is equally at home playing covers as its own original jazz fare. With bandleader Marsalis leading, this is one dangerous group that knows how to play meticulously around the beat with grace and expertise.
“With us, it’s all about sound and the power it has to create emotion,” Marsalis has said of the quartet’s most recent studio work. “When you deal with sound, you don’t play the same thing twice in a row. You listen to each other, and every song is different.”
Pop culture fans who were introduced to Branford Marsalis by his association with Sting on the ‘Dream of The Blue Turtles’ should check out the jazz man’s body of work since the mid-80’s. Not only has Marsalis been prolific as a bandleader and musician, he’s been featured on myriad projects including Bela Fleck, Harry Connick Jr., Grateful Dead, James Taylor and Roy Hargrove.
Although Marsalis has been stylistically compared to saxophone giants such as Coltrane and Shorter, he’s forged his own identity. Now with a huge body of work and a ferocious quartet at his side, the upcoming Mondavi performance should prove rewarding to both newcomers and jazz aficionados alike. Whether you’re versed in jazz or not, the evening’s program may deliver a handful of aural surprises.
The Branford Marsalis Quartet plays Wednesday, February 28 at Jackson Hall inside U.C. Davis’ Mondavi Center. The venue is located at One Shields Avenue in Davis. Tickets start at just $25 with premier seating topping out at $69 and can be purchased in advance at www.mondaviarts.org. Doors open at 6:30pm and the show starts at 7:30 p.m. All ages are welcome.
King Crimson’s founding guitarist Robert Fripp and businessman/producer David Singleton have been hosting a number of live discussions – and one is slated for The Sofia Theatre on Saturday night. The topics each evening are both heady and heavy with few boundaries set. The time on stage will include untold King Crimson stories with Singleton acting as the perfect counterpoint.
We caught up with David Singleton, who helped form the Discipline Global Mobile record label with Robert Fripp some 31 years ago.
News & Review: What are your current production projects outside of Robert Fripp and King Crimson?
David Singleton: After we first started the label, many artists were keen to join as we were perceived (rightly I would argue) as artist-friendly and ethical. So the roster swelled to about 20 artists. However, running a label of that kind took Robert Fripp and me away from our primary focus as artists and producers. So, in the early 2000s we took the decision to reduce the roster to just the work of King Crimson, Robert Fripp (including his various collaborations) and The Vicar (my own solo work). Since then, we have arguably had many of our most successful releases.
SN&R: The DGM label has produced myriad projects. Do you find that today’s business model of streaming, YouTube and the like, is more fruitful than simply releasing physical product as most labels did in the past?
Singleton: The digital and physical worlds are very different and we approach them differently. Every year we have released a substantial and lovingly curated boxed set based around each of the core albums in our catalog. These have been very well received and have arguably set a standard which others have sought to follow. For many years, while the majority of labels were complaining about falling sales, we had rising physical sales. The physical market remains very healthy if you make beautiful products which people wish to own. For us, the digital market divides into two camps. The first is the opportunity to make niche recordings available, which would never justify a physical release. A good example would be the DGMLive website where it is our intention to make available every recording we have of a King Crimson concert. This replaces the clandestine bootleg market. It is also at the bottom of a pyramid of releases. The website means that every recording is transferred. In so doing, we find the special moments which may justify wider circulation. Either as part of the King Crimson Collectors Club (the next step of the pyramid), or an individual release, or as part of a boxed set. The second part of the digital world are the mainstream streaming platforms such as Spotify. These do not make sense on a financial level. They do not generate sufficient income to justify creating a release just for the streaming platforms. In fact, we were one of the last artists to join them – waiting until 2019, the 50th anniversary of King Crimson. We made the catalog available on those services not due to the financial return, which remains tiny, but due to a responsibility to keep the music alive in the world – to present it to future generations who look to such places to find their music.
SN&R: What are your biggest concerns when releasing a new record?
Singleton: The world of physical distribution is changing rapidly as the market shrinks. We still have healthy physical sales, particularly in vinyl, but we are moving from a situation where we could justify manufacturing separately in Europe, the USA, and Japan to a period of consolidation. The high quality 200gm vinyl which we sell is, for example, only manufactured in Europe (one of the few places that still makes it) and then shipped all over the world. These changes should hopefully not affect music buyers (assuming that their local stores remain open), but there are changes within the systems that lie behind. And Amazon, of course, remains one of the main sellers.
SN&R: The latest ‘In The Court Of The Crimson King’ documentary is very somber in nature and seems purposely uneasy. Was that the intent?
Singleton: We have been approached many times over the years by broadcasters wishing to make a King Crimson documentary, and have always rejected these offers because they tend to make exactly the same cookie-cutter movie, just with different musicians – the musicians sitting in a studio talking about the old times, interspersed with comments from some journalists and some live clips. Robert Fripp knew Toby Amies was a fan of his first movie “The Man Whose Mind Exploded,” and we commissioned him to take the leap and make a brand new-style of music documentary. Beyond that, we gave him complete artistic freedom with no outside control. The movie was originally intended for release in 2019, which was the 50th anniversary of the band as, to misquote Robert Fripp “it seemed a good time to take stock of what it is that we have been doing for all these years.” If the film is uneasy, it is not purposely so, in the sense that this was not the intention. Perhaps that is simply a reflection of that fact, as mentioned by many of the protagonists, that being in King Crimson is not an easy experience. Hopefully, however, it is an artistically rewarding one.
SN&R: Your role as The Vicar releasing new music is multi-faceted. Will we see new music in 2024?
Singleton: You will see both a new Vicar Chronicle and new Vicar music in 2024. My only regret in recent years is that I have been unable to give sufficient focus to this – which is the key part of my work. Being a songwriter, as opposed to a singer-songwriter or a performer is a uniquely difficult and frustrating experience. You create music that no-one can hear until someone else gives it voice. I have wrestled with this conundrum my entire life. Some kind souls, such as Jeremy Stacey from King Crimson, are convinced that the solution is that I must sing the songs myself. That is one point of view. On the other hand, when I hear the right contribution from great singers such as Andy Yorke singing San Manuel on the first Vicar songbook, I know that I could never personally match that. So the songs are ready with many of the arrangements complete. I need to keep searching for the final piece of the puzzle, but there will be music!
SN&R: What do you feel is the sole purpose of these discussions you and Robert are holding?
Singleton: There is not a “sole” purpose behind the evenings with Robert Fripp and me. They are an open and exciting canvas, and I encourage people to come and help us paint. The evenings are worthwhile if we all leave feeling enriched – both the audience and Robert and me. In practice, the evenings tend to cover a number of different areas. Inevitably some fans want to hear Robert tell stories that he has told before. Which is fine. Or ask me about the workings of the industry. Which is also fine. But the excitement tends to start when we get beyond that often into territories I have never visited before. That can be mildly terrifying when you have several hundred people waiting to hear what you will say. I am personally fascinated by the whole question “what is music?” Why do so many of us dedicate our lives to its service, including the majority of those who attend these evenings, as they would not be there if it was not important to them. My own experience is that music is the language of the soul – but where does that lead? Perhaps we will all find out in the coming weeks. My own favorite comment about our evenings was from someone who went away saying that they “heard music” although they had been to an evening of talking. We are certainly not there to promote “new music.” This is a joint venture of exploration.
SN&R: On any given day, even without a new Robert Fripp or King Crimson, is there a lot of business to attend to?
Singleton: Sadly, there is endless business. Hence my problems in finding sufficient time for The Vicar. It has been reported in the press that we are currently in dispute with UMG over under-payment of streaming royalties. A case that is likely to go to court in May. In order to protect the catalog, and the income of the artists, we need to pay attention to such items, which are a constant irritation and really a distraction from our core purpose. So there is endless “stuff” seeking to fill the day. In fact, the various mis-dealings of the industry which have historically plagued my inbox were the genesis for The Vicar Chronicles – ‘Tales from the underbelly of the music industry,’ ‘Sherlock Holmes meets Spinal Tap’. I was working late one night in the studio with Robert Fripp when one such item hit our inboxes, and I asked Robert “why, given all the available material, has no-one written whodunits about the music industry?” His reply was “because you haven’t written them yet.” So now I have.
SN&R: Why don’t we see more King Crimson music licensed in movies and other like-minded media? Where have you licensed music in the past?
Singleton: We are certainly not against King Crimson music being licensed for movies. There have been standout examples, such as the use of “Starless” in Nicolas Cage’s movie Mandy. Or “In The Court of the Crimson King” in Pam and Tommy. There are some requests that we reject because the scenes seem unsuited to the music, but mostly we don’t get asked enough. I encourage more music editors to call.
‘An Evening with Robert Fripp & David Singleton: Englishmen Abroad’ happens at The Sofia located at 2700 Capitol Avenue in downtown Sacramento. Upper tier tickets are $45 while the much closer lower tier seats are $55. Both options can be purchased at www.bstreettheatre.org. Doors open at 7 p.m. and the show starts at 8 p.m. All ages are welcome.
Eddie
