49 years ago this week (1 October 1974), Red, the final King Crimson studio album of the 1970s was released. Roughly two weeks prior to the release of Red, King Crimson disbanded. The album was well received among fans and critics. It has received further praise retrospectively, being recognised as one of the band's best works, and has been reissued many times.
In 2001, Q magazine named Red as one of the "50 Heaviest Albums of All Time" and Pitchfork ranked Red number 72 in its "Top 100 Albums of the 1970s" list, stating that "For a band that was very obviously about to splinter, King Crimson's music sounds remarkably of a single mind. On Red, they achieved a remarkable balance between bone-crushing brutality and cerebral complexity."[34] Rolling Stone ranked the album at number 15 on their list of the 50 best progressive rock albums of all time. "Red" was also ranked as the twentieth best progressive rock song of all time by PopMatters.