40th Anniversary Edition of Red by King Crimson

I am deeply enjoying the experience of listening to the 40th anniversary edition of Red, by King Crimson, one of my top 10 albums of all time.

Much as i loved the original, I had two complaints:

1. The title track was flat sounding, like they recorded it in a fairly flat sounding room and did nothing to liven it up.

Well, this problem is fixed handily in the 5.1 mix; separation increases the fidelity of each instrument and the performance comes to life in a way that needs to be heard.

2. Providence, the first song on side two, was long and unlistenable. It was certainly unlistenable to me; I wanted more pounding, screeching prog rock and providence was several (too many) minutes of unnecessary noodling to my ears.

But in the 5.1 mix the clarity of each instrument is increased, and somehow the creepiness of the improvised, "concrete" performance is emphasized to the point where it becomes a new treasure, to me, and that means a big piece of this already wonderful album is now accessible to me for the first time. Bravo, gentlemen.

It also contains a CD version, versions in 96Khz 24-bit stereo, several unreleased tracks of varying interest, and some VERY well recorded videos from French television of what evidently seems to the be "Starless and Bible Black" era band performing songs like Lament and LTIA pt II, and very well.

I give it a good *****, it's wonderful, and certainly not more expensive than it needs to be.

http://www.king-crimson.com/album/red