Let's talk about late 60s/early 70s freeish Afrocentric/spiritual/astral jazz ("fire music").

Yes, I don't really have much to add, just love this stuff. It's weird how I usually just refer to it as "free jazz" even though a track like "The Creator Has A Masterplan" isn't really that free when you think of it, rather loose and repetitive.

Is Sun Ra supposed to "be part" of this? Some of his work during this time probably fits, and I think of Lanquidity perhaps as a further exploration of that sound...

The only Sun Ra stuff I actually like is from the early '70s - the two Solar-Myth Approach albums, for example, and a couple of live bootlegs like Outer Space Employment Agency and Life Is Splendid from, I think, '73 and '74 respectively.

Yes, sonder, the "free jazz" question is a matter of definitional difference btw europe & america (at least as far as musicians are concerned--maybe not so much of a "problem" for listeners). The Evan Parker/Derek Bailey school (of course not exclusive to them) is that the music or performance should be completely improvised and invented on the spot--no landmarks, no head, no chorus. The American (working) definition allows for heads, chords, and so on, such things as ostinato rhythm patterns with improvisatory leads played over, above, through, around.

My formative years were spent listening to and hanging around AACM bands who were called "free jazz" (among the printable names) and they would laugh about labels & categories. Mitchell, Jarman, et al., coined Great Black Music--Ancient to the Future to indicate an unbroken line from the first hominids banging rocks together to the present day, and included in that (obv.) African roots, New Orleans marching bands, minstrelsy, jazz, gospel, r&b, blues, Western and Asian classical, rejecting nothing, incorporating everything. It was common for them to be called unschooled and undisciplined, but whoever called them that had clearly never spent time with Mr. Mitchell or Mr. Abrams.

You ask if Sun Ra is part of this. From my perspective, the answer is "of course." Herman "Sonny" Blount, though an odd child in Birmingham, Alabama, fit right in the Chicago jazz scene. By the time that he became inhabited by Le Sun Ra, he had an orchestra that could play Ellington straight, out, or doubletime (inside or outside). Fred Anderson told me a tale of the days when Coltrane was in a sort of territory band (Vinson's? I'm not sure) with an extended residency in Chicago & he and Trane hung out with their contemporary John Gilmore, who taught them insider tips and techniques on the tenor. Perhaps Gilmore & Trane new each other from the Army? In any case, what Ra was putting out in the 50s was influential to others and he had continued the tradition of the territory bands of a sort of woodshedding school of the sort ultimately "institutionalized by Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers.

Ra also from the beginning modeled the path to recording one's one music, releasing, packaging, marketing, distributing it in the absence of any major label attention.

I have to say that I have a much wider appreciation for Sun Ra--Art Forms of Dimension Tomorrow was an album I bought circa 67-68 after hearing "Lights on a Satellite" on a Chicago radio station. I was 14 or 15, and I would play that album over and over with headphones on, falling asleep to this one and then to others I picked up as a consequence: We Travel the Spaceways, The Futuristic Sounds of Sun Ra, Nubians of Plutonia. I picked them out for their covers and the "cosmic" poems penned by Ra. They were completely DIY--and I still have Art Forms on vinyl in the original cover--I guess what I'm saying is that I understand that Ra was guilty of excess and meandering in search of an idea for too many albums over too many years, but I saw him live so many times in so many different circumstances (his, mine, and the venue's) that I find something of interest in almost everything he does. Though I am far from a completist or an obsessive over him.

The spiritual component was present in his band/community. Even then he was known to operate as a "cult" though the insiders considered it a family and a family business.

Here's a little side tale to show how those threads and connections travel in quite interesting ways (to me anyway, and I hope to some readers). In Sun Ra's bands of the 60s was a trumpet, zither, and kalimba player, Phil Cohran. (Phil is in his 80s now.) When Ra moved the "family" to NYC and later to Philadelphia, Cohran stayed behind. He had his own young family, and needed steady work, something he didn't foresee happening with Ra. Cohran was an early member of the AACM also, but left over conflicts in style and theory. At the time, the AACM were determined to break with the mainstream and were damn near as serious about everything as teh Fruit of Islam members, who frequented a lot of the same neighborhoods on the South Side. Cohran was an early adopter of mixing funk with free, and his (recently rereleased thank god) recordings of Malcolm X Memorial and On The Beach had an astounding group of young musicians, some of whom would record a couple of great deep funk albums as The Pharaohs, then splintered to become the Phenix Horns, who backed Earth Wind & Fire.

Phil Cohran was a mentor to a generation of Chicago musicians--not competing with but complementary to the AACM. Fred Anderson, likewise, supported a number of young musicians through the years, not the least of whom is the drummer Hamid Drake, who started playing with Fred as a teenager (Fred's own son was more interested in other music, but was also a drummer) and still plays with Fred whenever the occasion arises.

I've babbled on far too long.

Check out the newly available Cohran disks. And though I question the legitimacy of the Soul Jazz label (I frankly don't know anything about their business practices, but I will admit to being skeptical) I would recommend picking up their release of the disk by Maulawi Nurrudin, originally released by Strata Records (an artist run collective related to Strata East records). Soul Jazz call the style here "soul jazz" thus their interest, but it is part of that same exuberant street spirit that informed the artists that sonderangerbot began this thread asking about.

On the disk is also Adam Rudolph, who was then 16. He and his friend Hamid Drake joined with Foday Musa Suso to form the Mandingo Griot Society, who invited Don Cherry to guest on their debut album. Some of the Griot Society also backed Native American saxophonist Jim Pepper on his Comin' and Goin' (including both Hamid and Don Cherry on that date).

Ok, Ok. Enough for now. That ought to give anyone a start on following the thread of this genre of music from at least 1956 (Nubians of Plutonia) through 2007 (From the River to the Ocean--Fred Anderson & Hamid Drake).

Quick notes:

Phil, I enjoyed your words on Ranelin et al; obviously, I'd add Maulawi and Cohran to those lost classics

sonderangerbot, my apologies; thread started by Tuomas

seconded on the kosmigroov connection proffered by jaxon

Yeah, I have the earlier reissue of On The Beach from a few years back. And I've had many great conversations over the last 7-8 years with Drake, Anderson, and NYC-area players (Shipp, Ware, Parker, Roy Campbell - I highly recommend the new 2CD live set by Other Dimensions In Music, with Drake as drummer). Both it and From The River... made my Top Ten for this year's Village Voice jazz critics' poll, which I believe will be online on Wednesday.

I guess a few years back counts as "recently" for me.

I had the great opportunity to get to know Fred in the early 70s. I stop by to see him on the rare occasions I'm back in Chicago.

In the end ALL of this stuff worked to making the music much more friendly and less 'in-your-face', at least to an extent ("Magic City" is hardly a favourite with many though I do love it). Euro improv school took some of the music with a shared militancy (in some quarters) but with an amplified scepticism to pretty much everything ever - not exactly endearing qualitites to people listening to this stuff for the first time.

It's a shame the Other Dimensions In Music disc doesn't have Rashid Bakr on drums. I've seen him knock the corn out of the shit on numerous occasions. I like Drake, but I'm a little tired of watching him push everyone around drum-wise onstage.

Personally, I've always preferred the churchier sounding players to the new-agey ones. I don't think it's always an accurate critique, but I recall the Penguin Guide referring to a Pharoah Sanders record as mainly being about wearing funny hats. I think the quip could sometimes extend to David S. Ware, as well.

Frank Wright's great! His Center of the World discs, "Uhuru Na Umoja," the new issue on ESP, are all awesome.

this is pretty great - http://archive.org/details/BlackClassicalSpiritualJazz19552012

whoah

Yowzah

whatever track is playing at 1:30:00 is like some serious krautrock funk shit oh man

I wish epic wasn't such an overused word cos um

bummed I can only guess at what is what from the tracklisting, given that this is just one 12-hour long MP3

some serious judeo-christian themes set in around the 8hr mark (there's one track with a guy reciting the sh'ma?!), odd strain I had not really given much thought to before

there's a tracklisting up in the comments section....

I just picked up Max Roach's "We Insist!" which I really like.
I'm also looking for more Afrocentric revolutionary type jazz stuff.
I'm imagining Art Ensemble of Chicago with more vocals and chants

found the following by accident. looks like a free jazz doc is coming out soon:

http://firemusic.org/

this is also a pretty cool box on Spotify:

http://www.propermusic.com/cache/images/4/4/c/44c4de3e22c1f079508d75af1ac3962d.jpg

how bad are Horace Silver's early 70s "United States of Mind" albums

turbans count as spiritual jazz hats, right?

https://images.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.facerecords.com%2Fshop%2Fimages%2F4%2F4394003_1.jpg&f=1

I didn't know where else to put this, but Billy Harper should be much more well known than he is. His mid-70s albums: Soran-Bushi B.H., In Europe, and of course Black Saint are lights out. He is a tremendous player and extemporaneous thinker. just phenomenal stuff...

all his 70s stuff is great. and he's on a ton of great albums. i wish all those live recordings with the max roach quartet were easier for people to hear. mostly came out on japanese vinyl pressings in the 70s.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSpRH1mMYP0

thanks, I've never heard of them, let alone listened to them. Harper is just a special musician, I can't really put my finger on it.

i love the album on horo too. tons of stuff to dig into with billy harper!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MFsdt0ruLg

he was doing cool stuff with lee morgan too before lee's sad end.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6O4kb40-V_g

Yes! I love The Last Session, especially Angela and Capra Black. Lee had put together a great band at that time.

billy harper "capra black" just got reissued ...

guess I was looking at the turban rather than the words because I read the title of that Horace Silver album as THAT HAT FEELIN'

Am I correct in thinking that this is the main influence on the current Jazz explosion?

Which explosion is this again? If you mean Kamasi, then I'd say yeah totally.

Yeah, Kamasi and the West Coast stuff but also the stuff that's coming out of London rn.

Yup

was just listening to this japanese spiritual jazz comp — really amazing stuff in there: https://spiritualjazz.bandcamp.com/album/spiritual-jazz-8-japan-pt-1

Yeah, I've been eyeing that, and the other volumes of that series!

That Japanese Jazz comp on BBE has some amazing jams, many of them of the spiritual and/or modal jazz variety.

What stuff that's coming out of London, Daniel?

the Astrosonics/Black Classical Music linked upthread is probably the greatest comp ever (close call between that and New Wave Hits of the 80s imo)

Sons of Khmet etc.

xp

er Kemet

Yeah, all the acts from the <i>We Out Here</i> comp, ppl who play at Total Refreshment Centre, etc.

JUst got a cd called A Loud Minority Deep Spiritual Jazz from the Mainstream label. It looks really good but I got a faulty copy. Not seen a cd do this before it has stripes across teh silver. Looks like its new but somewhere the process has gone wrong.
I heard a bit of the 2 Frank Foster tracks on it but can't play the disc.
Anybody familiar with it? Is it worth tracking down another copy of?

Nyc group Elder Ones fucks with this vibe imo

I've seen notices that Idris Ackamoor & The Pyramids are coming to Zebulon in L.A. and it's tempting. I always wonder how musicians who were active in the 70s will be today though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZfWeqzjt444

dancing is kinda ridiculous in that clip but the music is great

for new london jazz check the comp “we out here”

oh daniel beat me to it

yeah what he said

look forward to hearing the Japanese compilation, was jammin to this one yesterday https://open.spotify.com/album/564B7NIpdF0je3rlh33cXC

That Loud Minority compilation looks pretty good:

https://www.discogs.com/Various-A-Loud-Minority-Deep-Spiritual-Jazz-From-Mainstream-Records-1970-1973/release/8205413

I have the three Buddy Terry albums on Mainstream; Awareness from 1971 is kinda Pharoah Sanders-ish spiritual jazz with a great band (Cecil Bridgewater on trumpet, Stanley Cowell on piano, Roland Prince on guitar, Victor Gaskin and Buster Williams on bass, Mickey Roker on drums, and Mtume on percussion), but another one, Lean On Him, is more like psychedelic gospel jazz. That one has Eddie Henderson on trumpet and Bernard Purdie on drums.

listened to the first two Pyramids albums last night. Pretty awesome.

I'm going to have to go through that archived tracklist carefully. This might be an ecstatic summer for me.

Got a replacement copy of teh loud Minority cd and it does sound pretty good.
Apparently there were a whole batch with the bad pressing, haven't come across it happening before so maybe if yo9u get one like that you get several.

But compilation is pretty groovy now i can actually listen to it.

was there a thread for spiritual hats? this one is great:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/35/Bent_J%C3%A6dig_Photo.jpg/1005px-Bent_J%C3%A6dig_Photo.jpg

Enjoying this mix by Martyn of '70s Latin/spiritual jazz/fusion/African percussion etc that I randomly stumbled on via NTS: https://www.nts.live/shows/martyn/episodes/martyn-31st-december-2018

Really liked the track by Open Sky - "Come To Supper Tonight, Rada". Thanks for the tip Jordan.

really feeling this today

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFQ1H40of48
michael white - the land of spirit and light

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PAnoz4CN70w

the drummer / composer on that one, david lee, has a great record from the same years, called "evolution"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mlJju4_3REI

similar vibe, i think it's george davis playing guitar on both

Yeah, I have that David Lee LP and it's wonderful. Nothing on it is quite as terrifying as 'In his Presence Searching' IMO but you made me want to listen to it again.

The beginning sounds like a Danny Brown sample waiting to happen (samples all over the place tbh)

recommended:

https://img.discogs.com/Nkcmz1xDDRrpojg3tHDSwYBWJVo=/fit-in/600x600/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(90)/discogs-images/R-13626617-1557791896-6621.jpeg.jpg
Juju - Live At The East 1973 LP

https://www.strandedrecords.com/collections/now-again/products/juju-live-at-the-east-1973-lp

unrelated but this gets stuck in my head multiple times a week, just amazing:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1cObNLQGxrM
Joe Zawinul - A Soul of a Village, Pt. II

Black Unity Trio - Update #1
Thank you for signing up for the waiting list / email list for our vinyl reissue of Black Unity Trio - Al Fatihah. We are really excited to be working with the musicians to make this an extremely special release.

We wanted to send this quick note to let you know the official street date is Friday, November 27, 2020. We will send you an update as soon as the pre-order is live.

Also, tomorrow (June 12, 2020), we will be streaming LIVE on Instagram playback of the 1968 master tapes during the safety session! Join us at @gottagrooverecs on Instagram at approx 1pm Eastern!

(Note: since it is the safety session, the playback will likely be periodically interrupted, and may not necessarily be the entire album -- but we thought it would still be a fun way to show you some behind-the-scenes work in the reissue of the album).

Thanks again for your interest in this album, and drop us a line any time!

-- Gotta Groove Records

Been eyeing that xpost George Lewis AACM history for a while: pricey, but well worth it, according to reviews I've seen.

One of the first jazz records I bought, still steaming and streaming:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lj5hQHO5ANs

wiki sez:
All compositions by Pharaoh Sanders except as indicated

"Healing Song" (Joe Bonner, Pharoah Sanders) - 21:43
"Memories Of J. W. Coltrane" - 12:51
"Lumkili" - 8:33

Personnel

Pharoah Sanders - tenor saxophone
Marvin Peterson - trumpet
Carlos Garnett - flute, voice
Harold Vick - tenor saxophone, voice
Joe Bonner - piano, harmonium
Stanley Clarke, Cecil McBee - bass
Norman Connors, Billy Hart - drums
Lawrence Killian - congas, bailophon

def lots of two bass hits of sunshine

this was recommended to by by youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iij6Wr8uP-w
ronnie boykins s/t

released on ESP-disk in 1975, so it must have been one of the very last releases. marzette watts is credited as engineer, which i find interesting, but i can't see any evidence that he plays. have been familiar with RB for his work with sun ra, never knew about but have really fallen in love with this solo record. it's very MOODY

looks like it's coming at last ...

https://www.strandedrecords.com/collections/gotta-groove/products/black-unity-trio-al-fatihah-lp

Not sure if this belongs here but I picked up a reissue of Fitz Gore & The Talismen's Soundmagnificat (out of the blue, the cover looked nice) and wow, this is beautiful! Groovy & melancholy, totally mesmerizing.