Interviews -Adrian Belew-

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When did you start talking about blues with Robert?

Adrian：Well, we've been talking about it in the last year or so. Maybe two years.

So before then, you never did?

Adrian：Not really, no. Blues was kind of an off-limits technique.

Why is that?

Adrian：Because with King Crimson, the way that the music operates is like this. If you have a box of 24 crayons, you pour them out and you take 5 of them, and you say "These are the only 5 you can use." That's how we work. You can't use the other things. So there's a certain amount of parameters around what we do. And it used to be that we wouldn't do anything that was similar to the blues. We've opened that door.

Did anybody suggest that the new album should have songs like "One Time", "Heartbeat" or "Matte Kudasai"? Personally, I was kind of hoping for a song like that.

Adrian：Yeah, ballads. It's missing a ballad. That's interesting. First time we've had a record that didn't have one. We're working on a brand new one, Robert and I, right now, that I think will be the next generation "Matte Kudasai". When we made the record, music just comes out and we just start working with it and molding it and shaping it, and it just didn't seem like there was a ballad at that time. The closest thing we came to was, there was an acoustic version of the "Larks' Tongue" coda that's called "I Have a Dream". And for a moment that was on the album and I thought that that would be the ballad. Then we took it off.

When you last came to Japan, you played "Dinosaur" on your own at the convention. It was great. This time, you played "Three of A Perfect Pair", which was also great.Are there any other King Crimson songs that you think would work well in an acoustic solo style?

Adrian：I have sometimes in my own solo shows in the United States done several others like "Matte Kudasai", and I'm trying to think of others. I think what's interesting about it is especially with something like "Dinosaur" or "Three of a Perfect Pair", you get to see really the song that's underneath all the heavy instrumentation. With "Three of a Perfect Pair" I think it surprises people because you get to hear what one person's playing and doing, and you can see then a different side of the music. I'd like to do more. Maybe "Heartbeat" would be a good choice too.

Is it all right for us to think that the songs you just mentioned, the ones that would go well acoustically, are the songs that you mostly contributed to?

Adrian：Well, with the songwriting, usually I'm the one who's doing the song writing, but some songs translate better to that acoustic format than others. I could probably play any of the songs that we have done, but some of them don't work as well. I guess that's an okay explanation -- I don't know if I can say it any better (laughs). See, I write all the songs, so the musical pieces are written by Robert or the band itself, and the songs are written by me taking usually something that the band has started, and molding it into a song, making changes and chord changes and adding melody and lyrics. That's always been my role in the band. Some of them, I sit down and play on my own first. Those are probably the ones that sound a little more complete on acoustic guitar.

If I remember correctly, Mr. Fripp said that no songs from before 1990 will be played on this tour, but --

Adrian：That's already changed because we're doing "Red" already. Well, you know, Mr. Fripp says lots of things (laughs). I think what we're going to do is gradually as we move forward with brand new material, we also introduce material from the past. When we did our European tour, we didn't do as much old material as we are now. We added four old songs since then. So as the band continues to grow, so will the repertoire, both old and new. That's the idea of it. I think Robert wants to avoid going back the the very very early things that might sound dated now. I'm not sure that I would feel that comfortable singing some of those older songs. Even though I loved them at the time, they don't really fit with what the world is today.

Is there a reason why you're playing "Red"?

Adrian："Red" has always been a classic Crimson piece, I think. It represents that style of writing that's really Robert's style. And I think it's passed on from "Red" to "Larks" to "Vroom" to "Vroom Vroom" to "Larks Part IV". They're all a style that Robert writes in. And so it fits with what we do now.

Why did you decide to play "Heroes"?

Adrian：Well, Robert played in the original version of "Heroes", and then I played it live with David Bowie as his guitar player and music director. So, we were thinking of finding a song that wasn't a King Crimson song, maybe a Beatles song or something. And finally we decided "Heroes" was appropriate because of the fact that Robert and I have both been involved in it. We just wanted to do someone else's song.

Isn't this the first time?

Adrian：Yeah, I don't think we've ever done any cover songs as they call them. It's the first time. I'm hoping that some place we'll play on the tour David Bowie will show up, and then he can sing it (laughs).

Do you enjoy singing it?

Adrian：Oh yeah, I love singing it. I love all the singing, but that's a very good song to sing, too. It's powerful. Emotional. One of my favorite David Bowie songs.

I thought your singing was great.

Adrian：Oh, thank you very much!

When I interviewed Mr. Fripp this spring during his promotional visit to Japan, he said to ask you about the lyrics to "Prozakc Blues". How did you come up with those lyrics?

Adrian：What I generally do for lyrics is I listen to the music and I know what the melody is going to be, and I listen to it over and over and gradually, it sort of tells me what it wants to be about. Does that make sense? You know, in other words, I can eventually hear that this could be emotional, or this could be a song that's word play, or this could be a song that's got some humor to it, or this one is really serious. With "Prozakc Blues", I thought it was important to have a humourous edge to it. Because the music was, in an absurd way playing the blues, I thought the lyrics should be that way too. A little absurd. A little nutty. I like the idea that the singer, at the end of the song, shaves off his own head, and then he's dead (laughs). That's pretty absurd.

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