This Day in Music

The re-emergence of the masters, feeling a little chest pain, combatting censorship, and Elvis is in the navy? All on this Good Friday in music.

Bookends

1968: American folk-rock duo Simon & Garfunkel release their fourth studio album, “Bookends.” With the increasing success of their previous two studio outputs and their work on the soundtrack to the movie The Graduate, the pair were gaining in popularity.

Side A of “Bookends” is conceptual, composed of songs about life's journey from childhood to old age, and includes the Top-40 hit, “America.” Side B is a collection of tunes written over the prior two years, including the classics, “A Hazy Shade of Winter,” and a re-release of “Mrs. Robinson” from The Graduate.

The LP became the duo's breakout work, going to No. 1 on the Billboard 200 and No. 1 on the U.K. Albums Chart. The single “Mrs. Robinson” went to No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100. “Bookends” was certified double-Platinum, placing Simon & Garfunkel among the elite of recording artists of the day, with Bob Dylan, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, and Aretha Franklin.

Vol II

2026: Saguenay, Québec-based mantra-rock Pythago-cubist instrumental duo Angine de Poitrine release their second studio album, “Vol II.”

Founded by noble brothers Khn de Poitrine and Klek de Poitrine in 2023, the pair’s music is a dynamic interplay of constantly evolving themes that employ microtonal chromatic scales and digital loops for guitar and bass, layered atop muted polyrhythmic patterns on drums, creating a unique sonic experience.

“Vol II” includes the excellent YouTube singles, “Mata Zyklek” and “Fabienk,” but all six tracks of the LP are fantastic.

The record is now available on iTunes, Bandcamp, YouTube, and Spotify, however the vinyl edition has already sold-out. The group will be performing to a packed house at Club Soda tonight in Montréal.

THRAK

1995: Legendary British-American prog progenitors King Crimson roar back to life following a ten-year interregnum, releasing their eleventh full-length studio album, “THRAK.”

The band had issued an accompanying EP the year before titled “VROOM.” All but two of the six tracks from “VROOM” were re-recorded for “THRAK,” providing fans with sublime alternate versions of the songs “VROOM,” “THRAK,” “Sex, Sleep, Eat, Drink, Dream,” and “One Time.”

The first and only studio album to feature Crimson's “double-trio,” it saw the return of the classic lineup from the “three-colours” era, Robert Fripp (g) (naturally), Adrian Belew (g; v), Tony Levin (bg; Chapman Stick; v), and Bill Bruford (d), augmented by bottom-end player Trey Gunn on Warr and bass guitars, and drumset percussionist Pat Mastelotto, ex- of Mr. Mister and XTC.

Together, they formed the THRAK iteration of the band. It would also be the final studio album to feature Tony Levin and Bill Bruford, though Levin would return for the Radical Action iteration in 2013, and appear on subsequent live releases.

Bruford by that time was focused on his jazz ensemble, Earthworks, his record companies, his autobiography, speaking tours, and earning his PhD in Music from the University of Surrey, becoming Dr. William Scott Bruford in 2016.

Recorded at Peter Gabriel's Real World Studios in Wiltshire U.K. and produced by the band with the assistance of Fripp collaborator David Bottrill, the unique double-trio of instrumentation is presented in a split format. The opening track, “VROOM,” features all six musicians centred in the stereo mix, and as the album progresses, the two trios are divided, with one guitar-bass-drum grouping in the left channel, and the other guitar-bass-drum grouping in the right channel. The groupings are intermixed however, it’s not the same guitar-bass-drum combination of musicians in each channel of each song.

The double-LP was embraced by critics, with Trouser Press describing it as “...an absolute monster, a cerebral sextet adventure stunning in its precisely controlled rock power” and AllMusic writing that King Crimson was “...the only progressive rock band from the '60s to be making new, vital, progressive music in the '90's.”

Fans were overjoyed with the record, making it the second-highest selling release of the band's career, and one of my personal favourites.

The Friday Frank

1986: Appearing on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, Frank Zappa discusses the dangers, overstepping, and silliness of censoring rock music lyrics, specifically legislative actions in Maryland, and the Parents Music Resource Center (PMRC), a cabal of hideous congressional wives intent on imposing their Puritan will onto other people, led by the odious Tipper Gore. Carson was allied with Zappa on the issue, along with most of the larger entertainment industry.

The Daily Elvis

1956: The Milton Berle Show welcomes Elvis live from the aircraft carrier USS Hancock. Presley performed “Heartbreak Hotel,” “Money, Honey,” and “Blue Suede Shoes” to the sheer delight of the crew.

Linked: Mata Zyklek by Angine de Poitrine.