Over his half century leading King Crimson, Robert Fripp has built a reputation as a steely dictator. But former frontman Jakko Jakszyk says he nearly ruined that image with just one sentence.
A singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, Jakko got to know Fripp through his musical connections with former King Crimson members. Their friendship eventually resulted in the 2011 album A Scarcity of Miracles , created with British saxophonist and flautist Mel Collins and credited to Jakszyk Fripp & Collins. Jakko joined Fripp's revised King Crimson lineup in 2013, replacing long-standing guitarist Adrian Belew.
But as Jakko tells Classic Album Review, he nearly got off on the wrong foot with Fripp after Classic Rock magazine asked him if he found the band leader difficult to work with.
“I said, 'Look, all you can do is speak as you find,'” Jakko recalled. “And I said, 'I gotta tell you that Robert has been incredibly supportive and encouraging. He hasn't been difficult at all. It's been amazing.'"
“Months went by, and we started rehearsing,” he continued. “In the first week of rehearsal, the magazine in which I did this interview came out. And at the end of one rehearsal, Robert said, 'Jakko, can I have a word, please?'
"And I thought, Oh, fuck…
“He called me over and said, 'Jakko, I just read your interview with Classic Rock magazine.’ I went ‘Right.' He said, 'Yes. In the future, can you stop saying nice things about me? It's ruining my reputation.’”
The exchange may have been tongue in cheek, but it underscores an important point about King Crimson's leader. As Jakko explains, there's a divide between Fripp the character and Fripp the man. "It isn't black and white," he says.
Jakko has also worked with Jethro Tull’s Ian Anderson, who shares a similarly authoritarian reputation. Anderson gave an example of this himself when he recently revealed to Guitar Player that he could only rely on himself to fix "Locomotive Breath" when recording Tull's classic Aqualung record. But here again, Jakko says, his experience differs from the perception.
“It's like all of these things,” he says, “they're much more complicated and nuanced. Sometimes people are arseholes, I get [it]. And sometimes, it says more about the person that’s slagging the other person off than it does that person, too."
He addds, "Robert's a pretty unique bloke. He created his own universe. He lives in a world of his own creation. And some of the things he objects to and doesn't want to tolerate, well that's his thing. Luckily, I've not really been at the sharp end of some of that stuff. I've seen him be, what would he call it? Direct.”
As time goes on, Fripp does seem to be softening his public image, as noted by the successful Sunday Lunch project he created with his wife, Toyah. He even jokingly launched an OnlyFans account for April Fool’s Day.
Still, Fripp's brusqueness remains, as when he said in 2022 that he “doesn’t give a fuck” what King Crimson fans think of his YouTube covers.
While Sunday Lunch remains his priority, he’s given his blessing for former bandmates Belew and Tony Levin to continue flying King Crimson’s flag with Beat.
That tour, which is currently ongoing, sees Steve Vai having to master Fripp’s parts, which he’s talked about in great length. Belew too faced similar challenges when he first joined the band, admitting he only locked in with Fripp after he showed him a new way to hold his pick.
It’s also seen Belew pick up his signature Parker Fly guitar, a MIDI synth guitar he begged Ken Parker and Larry Fishman to make for him.
