Unless you're one of the lucky few, you have never heard the music on this CD re-release of the original 1970s small run, self-produced El Saturn disc. So here is, for Sun Ra fans or those yet to be, some middle-period mash from the voodoo doctor of choice for free jazzers and roots music alike. In fact Ra's music is powerful because it doesn't see divisions between the simple and the complex nor the "in" and the "out," wrong. It is simply concerned with beautiful music that exudes the love ethos that underlies the appeal of this neo-blues-based improvising collective.
The title cut, which made up the whole second side of the original vinyl release, simmers with positive vibes as the collective groove gets deep and afro-centric, appropriate, since the piece is about the affirmation of black identity, which, in the mid-60s hothouse of black consciousness, was still in seedling form, growing out of the dirt of oppression and injustice. Black beauty is the Sleeping Beauty the musicians urge to awaken in this shimmering, prophetic piece.
"Springtime Again" and "Door of The Cosmos" work as first and second movements to this three-sectioned disc. The Arkestra never sounded better with the sheering tenor of John Gilmore, the bursts of brilliance of Marshall Allen's alto and Michael Ray's trumpet, and all the others, 16 in all, including ethereal-yet-earthy vocalist June Tyson and Sun Ra's masterly expressionism on electric piano and organ. Of course, all of the instrumental colors, the Arkestra's forte, are resplendent, as every musician plays the role of expressionist with either pre-composed or improvised statements with everyone on the same telepathic frequency.
Although it echoes some of the popular styles of the 1970s, this masterpiece stays undated because it is cosmic music. You can't ever get more relevant than that!
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