A mixture of mostly R&B and soft jazz combined with a taste of drum programming, synths, flutes, trumpets and sax. I dunno…maybe it takes more than one listen to really get the feel of what these Blackbyrds are trying to put across. I'll tell you this much, it's not the Blackbyrd music from their funky fusion days. If the name Incognito was slapped on the front of this CD it would be a distinct improvement. After listening to the CD I was really disappointed. Not one cut on it made me want to get up and groove except "No Stopping", an Incognito tune if ever I heard one. Drum programmed front to finish, synth-laden lead and accompanied by more synthetics, yet it's the best track on this mediocre effort. I was expecting so much more from the Blackbyrds as it's been decades since they've produced a studio album. This lackluster release really wasn't worth the effort.
King Crimson guitarist/founder Robert Fripp's famous quote that "King Crimson is a way of doing things" has seldom seemed truer than on THE POWER TO BELIEVE. The group's second studio album as a quartet in the wake of old hands Tony Levin and Bill Bruford's departure fits fully into the ever-shifting but consistently regenerative Crimson continuum. "Level Five" and the multi-part title track are pounding, counterpoint-filled tunes that hark back to Crimson's oft-revisited touchstone "Larks Tongues in Aspic."
When King Crimson hit the road in 2003 in support of The Power to Believe (2003), they brought with them this very interesting piece of multimedia memorabilia only available at live shows. The Power to Believe Tour Box (2003) includes both a glossy 20-page, full-color book as well as a 65-minute audio CD containing excerpts from recent interviews as well as a few musical nuggets that almost got away. The disc commences with seven tracks (approximately 16 minutes) taken from a pre-tour press conference. The Q&A features Adrian Belew (guitar/vocals/electronic percussion/lyrics/spoken word), Robert Fripp (guitar/spoken word), as well as Trey Gunn (Warr guitar/spoken word) and was held at the Hollywood, CA-based Sushi on Sunset, Saturday January 18, 2003…