Robert Fripp's Diary

DGM HQ The sun was

11.04

DGM HQ.

The sun was shining, and the sky blue, over frostiness.

Frosty DGM Parkland at 07.35…

DGM Parking Lot…

DGM Bathroom…

Only a DGM bathroom could have a King Crimson flight case that has been to Buenos Aires.

First arising of the business day: dealing with a licensing request for the original studio version & title track Red (1974) to be included on a Progressive Rock compilation. From my reply…

the suggested presence of Red on this proposed compilation evokes a variety of responses from me, including hilarity, anger, despair & curiosity as to who & why thought of this. i doubt that my curiosity will be satisfied.

FYI: there are several titles & artists in this compilation who are very much out of place. Red is one of them, but for other reasons.

i guess by now you know my response to the licensing request.

These were the proposed terms…

Licensed Masters:             KING CRIMSON – “Red”

Compilation Record:         Progressive Rock Album (tbc)

Authorised Formats:        Double CD

Release Date:                     5 June 2006 (tbc)

Catalogue Number:           TBC

TV Advertised:                    No

Number of Tracks:            Approx 40 (tbc)

Territory:                              UK & Eire

Term:                                    5 years + 6 month sell off

Advances:                           £500 per track 

Royalty Rate:                      18%

Royalty Base Price:           Net ppd TBC

Club/mail order/export:     50% of the otherwise applicable royalty rate, based on the price accounted to Licensee by such club/mail order/export operation.

So, what might an innocent audient punter make of this, I wonder? These are the 3 items that immediately draw my attention:

Royalty Base Price:           Net ppd TBC

Net on what, I wonder? What deductions are applicable?

But these are the stinkers…

Territory:       UK & Eire

Club/mail order/export:     50% of the otherwise applicable royalty rate, based on the price accounted to Licensee by such club/mail order/export operation.

Two territories, one very small & one relatively small. So, where are the records going? Clearly, abroad. That is, they are being exported. Exports attract 50% royalties on the price accounted to Licensee. So, press up as many as you can & send them to the EEC and anywhere else you like at any price you like to ask (ie bulk discount).

Ever wonder how much the artists make on CDs/DVDs given away free in newspapers?

Another licensing issue this morning: for a Crimson track to be used in a film by
Noah Baumbach with Nicole Kidman, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Jack Black to be distributed by Paramount Classics. The fee proposed is modest, but the terms suggested are straightforward.

Upstairs, Crimson On Fire! from Shepherd’s Bush is werning in SoundWorld II. Frame By Frame is blasting away at an astonishing tempo. FxF was never written to be played at this speed. But in the fire of the moment, and in the context of the particular overall tempo of the unfolding performance, the front man hits the tempo that feels right; and the guitarist stage left is hung out to dry. Many of the KC pieces with fast guitar lines were conceived to be played fast, but at much slower tempi than rendered in later performance. Practising to maintain the capacity to play at this speed began to limit my growth & development as a player: concentrating on extended sprinting focused my practise on a very limited area of executant capacity. Other areas, such as developing a broad, fluent musical vocabulary, got squeezed.

12.34    A morning of clearing stuff & e-flurrying . Off to Bredonborough – if I can
get out the door.

17.50    Bredonborough.

Just north of the M4, on the A417 heading to the M5 north, while overtaking a truck at 70 mph, a driver on my left pulled straight out in front of me. She hadn’t looked before pulling out. I narrowly avoided piling into the central crash barrier. Life & death in a moment.

22.34  An evening practising. An alarming sense of future King Crimson music has been flying by all evening. This is truly terrifying. Once upon a time, this would have had the effect of utterly turning my life around, taking on all manner of grief & distress to set up the context in which it might enter the world. Now, I don’t feel that compulsion, nor the need to remove all possibility of feeling joy to be alive, to make this happen. So, I’ll let this percolate.