Search & Destroy: Sun Ra

If not, could somebody hurry up and do it?

there WAS a bootleg about a year ago but i was assured this was official. i don't really know what to believe with rough trade cos it all depends who you speak to. try the scot with the beard. i assume you went to the covent garden one with the tramps and the cheese and the skaters and whatnot

if all fails i'll dub it 4 u

yes, I went to the covent garden shop.

muhaha in that case i will get a another copy and flog it on eBay

High points from "Live at the Wonder Inn": a performance of "Angels and Demons at Play" and "How High the Moon." The latter, of course, is just the sort of "material in a traditional jazz vein" I was talking about, but I like it nevertheless. I think I like this song now. I notice that during much of "Spontaneous Simplicity," someone is playing a clave rhythm. I have heard something close to the clave rhythm before in Sun Ra songs, but I don't think I've ever heard it played this overtly.

The sound on "The Majestic Session" is a little more problematic. When the music gets loud and all musicians are playing simultaneously, the distortion is pretty bad. It's a pity, since the energy is definitely there. I like Sun Ra's solo at the beginning of "Velvet," though it's hard to make it out. I haven't quite sorted through the four pieces titled "Majestic" 1-4. I think my favorite is the 4th.

I like the CD as a package (aside from the nasty adhesive which doesn't want to come off). The liner notes are good, and there are some very cool photos from the Wonder Inn. (For a more adequate review, check the one somebody who knows a lot mroe than I do posted on amazon.com.)

how about all of the supposedly 200-odd el-saturn lps out there that aren't re-issued ? anybody got some saturn vinyl they'd like to mention ? ok, recommending these odd small-run bootleg type lps would be pointless, but if everyone here had one real el-saturn piece of vinyl, it might be a different one from anyone else's here, hopefully

200+ privately issued lps -- some very limited, issued casually at gigs from the '60s to the '80s -- let's hear about the ones that haven't made it to the re-issue process and maybe may never re-appear -- made it into anyone's collection ?

how about it ? not s/d, more a special swap meet on saturn ?
some el-saturn record that you and possibly you alone might be able to say something about ..

I'm not a collector of rarities. There is too much that is easily available which I haven't gotten to (not just for Sun Ra, but in general).

Space is the place, what else?

Singles is an invaluable reference.

Solo Piano (Vol. II) (a.k.a. St. Louis Blues) is a revelation.

Presumably it's http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&uid=11:11:51|AM&sql=Bcnez97u7krat

'Strange Strings' is relentless acoustic noise, it does not let up. It's what I was hoping 'Atlantis' would sound like.

'Secrets of the Sun' is probably my favorite of the early stuff, where they're still caught between big band traditional playing and free form.

I remember hearing a version of "Astro Black" (presumably from the album of the same name) that sounded better, but this was back when I was a teenager, and my recollection is pretty vague after 20 or so years of not hearing it since.

well done ra-kist. nothing to fear as i said on top of the thread to deraymi (you both thought it was diff...that's 'uncanny' (sp? vocab?), that is).

(yes i tried html type stuff and i fucked it up)

[Note: kist=stone sarcophagus, therefore: ra-kist would be the coffin of the sun, or the earth itself, since the sun descends into the earth, each night.]

(So Ra-Kist Scientist is my esoteric name.)

o. nate, I'm honestly a little leery of the live recordings in general. (Nothing Is. . . is probably my favorite of that bunch, though I also really like the live half of the quirky Music from Tomorrow's World that came out last year, but that's from the 60's. I don't especially like anything I've heard on Leo records, except for brief moments. Actually Live at the Pitt Inn (in Japan) is not bad, but I still listen to that more for individual tracks than as a whole album (and it's expensive).

Really? I've been slowly building up my Sun Ra collection and so far one of the richest veins I've been mining are all those John Sinclair-produced reissues of the Arkestra's appearances at the Ann Arbor Blues & Jazz Festival ("Outer Space Employment Agency", "Life is Splendid", "It is Forbidden") - I like the blend of early 70s synths, the chants, and the free-blowing horn sections. What's your take on these?

I saw them do a show of mostly Disney songs in Philadelphia many years back, when June Tyson was still around, and it was great, but the Leo CD didn't work for me. (They also did a smaller scale Disney tribute this past summer, but it wasn't as impressive as that earlier show.)

Shakey, I don't know if I've heard those recordings.

I'll see if I can dig up that tape and make a copy for you if you like.

Shakey, it's not sound quality: it's just that sometimes I feel the live spectacle doesn't translate well into merely a sound recording. For instance, I've heard more than one live recording where the opening "space chord" sort of chaotic blowing session just gets tedious. Or, the goofier end of their material somehow comes across as too goofy, where I don't think it would bother me in concert. I don't have a turn-table either.

I'm technologically very limited.

Do you do orgies?

Marshall Allen interview - 100 years young this year!

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2024/feb/02/a-man-cannot-learn-without-discipline-jazz-guru-marshall-allen-on-life-with-sun-ra-and-turning-100