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Title: A blot on a noble discography
Review: Crim-loving friends of mine assure me that this album is a misunderstood masterpiece. I understand it perfectly well, and it's an embarrassment, quite the worst Crimson album ever and only not a trial to sit through because it's so boring. The lyrics are among the drivellingest Peter Sinfield ever committed to paper, the musicianship is no more than competent (Fripp's much-praised solo on Sailor's Tale sounds to me like uninspired thrashing fed through a reverb to make it sound more tortured) and the vague gestures towards classicism are frankly amateurish. In fact the only pleasure to be regularly received from Islands is the comforting delusion that one could have done better oneself. Strange that, two years later, this band was one of the best in the world.
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