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Cut from a transfer of the original masters for the first time since 1970. Mastered by Jason Mitchell at Loud Mastering. Pressed on 200gram Super-Heavyweight vinyl at Vinyl Factory UK. Official vinyl . The shock of King Crimson's arrival, ascendancy and transatlantic success - all in a period of just under a year - carried within it the seeds of the line-up's implosion in December of 1969 when Ian McDonald and Michael Giles left the band. Taking up the option to record an album as a duo - with Michael's brother Peter taking the role as bass guitarist - the eponymous album was recorded in the summer of 1970 and released in the UK in November of that year. It was and remains a minor classic of the late British Underground era - an album that could only come from that particular time and place and, very obviously, an album that was always intended as just that - a studio construct with no evidence that it was ever imagined as music that could or might be played on the 1970 gig circuit - (though some of the material would be performed more than thirty years later in 2002 by the 21st Century Schizoid Band). Inevitably perhaps, there was some continued crossover with King Crimson activities - both Michael and Peter played on the Jan/April sessions for Crimson's InchIn the Wake of PoseidonInch prior to the recording and Peter Sinfield contributed lyrics for side 2 of McDonald & Giles Birdman'. Inevitable also, that some material had a shared lineage with KC, most notably in 'Flight of the Ibis', as it was the original melody for what became 'Cadence and Cascade'. But if Mike's instantly recognisable drum sound and position as that generation's most gifted drummer and Ian's skills as a multi-instrumentalist and composer were, by this point, established, the considerable charm of the record comes from the different direction in which the duo took some of the familiarities fro
