(Credits: Far Out / Alamy)

David Bowie and Robert Fripp enjoyed a close partnership during the 1970s, with the King Crimson guitarist lending his magical skillset to ‘The Starman’. However, as life took them in different directions, they naturally drifted apart and didn’t speak as regularly as they once did with their final encounter, a situation that left Fripp with carrying significant regret.

Brian Eno was responsible for bringing Fripp into Bowie’s universe. The former Roxy Music musician was a frequent collaborator with Fripp, first working together in 1973 on (No Pussyfooting). When Eno was producing Heroes, he felt his former accomplice had the necessary ingredients to bring a new dimension to Bowie’s sound, which proved to be a masterstroke.

Following the split of King Crimson, Fripp moved to New York and decided to leave music behind, but Bowie would ignite a spark within him that led to a new creative chapter. During this period of his career, Fripp lent his skills to revered artists such as Talking Heads, Peter Gabriel and Daryl Hall, but it all began with Bowie’s gamble.

On Heroes, Fripp played lead guitar across the project, and following the success of the venture, he returned to the fold for 1980’s Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps). Heroes marked the first time in three years that Fripp had operated as a lead guitarist. However, during an interview with Q, he revealed that he told Eno, “If you’re prepared to take a risk, so will I.”

As Fripp stated, it was a risk which could have backfired, but it proved to be a stroke of genius that showed the extensive magnificence of the King Crimson guitarist. However, they only worked together on two albums before splintering off into other avenues, and Bowie, in characteristic style, rotated his cast of collaborators.

While the opportunity to team up on another project never arose, Bowie did reach out in 2002 with an offer that would have brought them back together for one night only. The singer-songwriter was tasked with curating the line-up for Meltdown Festival in London, recruiting acts such as Coldplay, Badly Drawn Boy, Suede, Supergrass, Television and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs for the sonically sprawling set of events.

However, much to his disappointment, Bowie failed to convince Fripp to take to the stage, and the pair never had the chance to speak again. During an interview with Rolling Stone in 2019, Fripp revealed Bowie contacted him at the home of Adrian Belew with the enticing opportunity that ultimately didn’t come to fruition.

He explained: “[There] wasn’t enough time to do it properly, so I declined. My wife [singer-songwriter Toyah Wilcox] has never forgiven me. My wife is a very considerable Bowie fan. That’s an opportunity missed, but I don’t feel I could honorably have engaged with it.”

While, from an official standpoint, Fripp stopped working with Bowie in 1980, in the same interview, he revealed that he still “regularly” has “dreams of both Eno and Bowie”. He elaborated: “Always interesting, always wonderful in their way. And I’ll just say: Whenever you work with someone creatively and intensively, something changes; something is fused. It’s maybe something like having a lover, where they’re always part of your life.”

Although Meltdown Festival would have provided Fripp with one last chance to cross paths with Bowie, the two albums they made together are an integral part of musical history, which continues to inspire and find new audiences. They may have gone their separate ways creatively, but their two careers will always be intertwined.