In his 1997 book Rocking the Classics, critic and musicologist Edward Macan notes that In the Court of the Crimson King "may be the most influential progressive rock album ever released".The album was remastered and re-released on vinyl and CD several times during the 1980s and 1990s.All of these versions were based on tape copies that were several generations removed from the originals.The original first-generation stereo master tapes were thought to be lost, but were finally located in a storage vault in 2003.