Sun Ra Music

Unlike most of the other reviews, this review is written from the perspective of a relative newcomer to Sun Ra's music who is not a newcomer to jazz. About ten years ago when I began getting into jazz, I heard a snippet of Sun Ra's music that was some of the most raucous and chaotic noise I had ever heard. At that point, I basically wrote Sun Ra off as anyone I would ever want to listen to again. Ten years and thousands of jazz albums later, I have finally returned to Ra in search of new and interesting sounds. I was only disturbed to find out what I had been missing all these years!

As, it seems, with many of Sun Ra's cds released by Evidence, this cd combines two LPs. The first, Angels and Demons at Play, combines some really haunting piano by Sun Ra with some incredible saxophone solos by John Gilmore. There are a lot of spots in which the band plays together as a unit or plays a series of alternating lines in response to one another. The harmonies and general playing of the band simultaneously convey an odd sense of spookiness with a feeling of real excitement about the music. Considering the primitive equipment on which this was recorded, the sound is very good.

The Nubians of Plutonia combines, as the title suggests, complex African rhythms with the spacey melodies characterisitc of the Arkestra. Though the recording quality dulls the drumming somewhat (it is better on some tunes than others), the rhythms drive the other players to creative heights that exceed those on Angels and Demons, creating an unexpected combination of earthiness and spaceyness. As a newbie to Ra, this album--which is not nearly as free or dissonant as a lot of his other music--is highly recommended, especially to those who are already jazz fans and in search of new and creative sounds.

This is a great place to start if you're discovering Sun Ra. Another album I'd strongly suggest is "Sun Ra Visits Planet Earth/Interstellar Low Ways."

Sun Ra has made a huge number of recordings with his Arkestra... His albums range from adventurous to downright insane. This particular album and the other one I mentioned contain a very pleasing balance of all the things that make Sun Ra so much fun: the big band, the swing, the rumba, the wild orchestrations and rhythms, the improvisations, and the overall "interplanetary funkmanship" of which George Clinton once sang.

My first Sun Ra album was actually a wild one: "Other Planes of There." I really like it, along with another adventurous title "Cosmic Tones for Mental Therapy/Art Forms of Dimensions Tomorrow." There are a number of these wilder examples of free jazz in his catalogue, and there are also more conventional albums.

My recommendation is to begin with the more conventional albums, because they offer plenty of fun insanity to begin with. "Angels & Demons at Play/The Nubians of Plutonia" is a particular favorite of mine. If you can get a hold of a copy, check it out!

This is great music. I bought this CD after hearing an NPR blurb on Sun Ra and his music, during which they played an exerpt of Aithiopia, which really got my attention. The CD exceeded my expectations. The sound is very exotic (not in a kitchy Martin Denny/Les Baxter exotica way). It's like nothing else I've heard. Listen to the sample of "Angles and Demons at Play," and enjoy. The only oddity is the inclusion of "Urnack," which is a little mainstream and out of place on this CD. The sound quality could be better, but the low-fi kind of adds to the atmosphere. Enjoy-

I love albums by performers who are in the midst of transitions. Think about the Beatles albums: Rubber Soul and Revolver. They were in the midst of the transiton that freed up their playing, yet they were still remained connected to their roots. That is what Angels and Nubians is like in the Sun Ra catalogue. It is suspended in the middle of a big change of direction from a tighter big band sound to free jazz. It is very complex in mood and is really groovy to boot. A great intro to Sun Ra.

"Angels and Demons" is a short 8-song collection (more an "EP" than an "LP") that shows Ra's Chicago-era Arkestra doing some of their best work, moving from colorful big-band music (tracks 5-8) to more idiosynchratic music that reflected Ra's belief is cosmology (tracks 1-4).

"Nubians" is a heavily percussive LP that influenced Coltrane among others. The recording quality on it varies from good to so-so. There are some wonderful compositions on it and many lengthy moments of drum-fueled ambience - "global trance" - that sound contemporary today, and were extraordinary for the late 1950's.

Can these guys even play? It sounds like amateur hour at the local open mike night. Sloppy playing and thoughtless arrangements of a few standards and a couple of originals. It's basically a straight-ahead quintet with Sun Ra noodling above it all on synthesizer apparently whenever the spirit moves him. I laughed out loud several times at his absurd interjections. None of the soloists generate much excitement and the occasional interesting idea is never explored or developed. Gilmore especially sounds tired and bored. Maybe Sun Ra is a jazz legend but this record sounded like jive to me.

This greatly underrated album is wonderful, trippy jazz. What we have is basically a 5-piece band comprising Chris Anderson on piano, John Gilmore on tenor sax, plus bass, drums and guitar. Then, in addition, we have Sun Ra tinkling away mostly in the background adding synthesiser effects that give the music that unmistakeable Sun Ra flavor.

Round Midnight is one of the best versions of the tune I have heard, and the 11-minute S'Wonderful is, well, wonderful.

Not much detail on the liner notes, but it is 65-minutes of great music. Two of the tracks can be downloaded from Amazon in MP3 form, so if in doubt, check it out. The quality of the recording is excellent, and apart from a little polite applause at the end of each track, you would never know it's a live recording.

Very, very enjoyable.

Update November 2006

The original part of this review was written a few years ago and was one of the first reviews I wrote for Amazon. This album remains one of my all-time favorites, and while it may not be to everyone's taste, if you do like it, then there is nothing like it. At moment of writing I just finished listening to Round Midnight and still have a smile on my face.

Recorded near the end of his life, he sounds tired. The band -especially Gilmore-sounds good, but Sun Ra's playing is less than dazzling. Stick with the Evidence titles

I do think these performances are quite enjoyable. In point of fact, this band was originally booked as John Gilmore's band. Ra appeared and performed on electric keyboard, adding effects, but the piano playing that is central on these pieces is played by another young man (whose name escapes me) who does sound pretty much exactly like Sun Ra on the instrument. To me the pieces here form a nice little triad of quality recordings from the late 80's/early 90's with "Blue Delight" and "Purple Night"; the music flows and the music speaks its piece.