I must confess that I never listened to much of the Sun Ra Arkestra. In fact I doubt if I listened to them at all! All the hocus-pocus about being from Saturn and the strange costumes were a complete turn off for me.
However, the discovery that he had history with Fletcher Henderson made me think again and when I heard the Tenement Jazz Band, who never got closer to Saturn than Edinburgh, playing one of Sun Ra's compositions - Chocolate Avenue - I greeted this album with less suspicion than I may otherwise have done.
Tyler Mitchell, Marshall Allen and the rhythm section are all alumni of the urban spaceman and this is the former's tribute to his galactic master.
There's little if any Fletcher Henderson here and even less of the Tenements but still plenty of good, honest, jazz. When the music does head off beyond Birdland's gravitational pull the resultant sounds, chaotic and, frantic as they are, sound just right. Any mouldy olde figges, and I suppose that these days us old beboppers come into the second or third generation of that category, might come to realise that jazz didn't end with the death of Jelly Roll, Louis, Duke, Bird or Trane but that, thanks to their groundwork, it continues to develop.
Mitchell's bass playing, as well as his compositions and arrangements, are no less than the project deserved whilst Allen's alto sound is totally his own. Dark, fluffy, almost as if Coleman Hawkins had played alto, it is original and a not unattractive alternative to the more traditional sounds of Parker, Pepper, Desmond, Woods etc.
Certainly the music of Sun Ra, on the strength of this album, deserves its place in the jazz hierarchy. Where exactly is up to you - the listener. Lance
Release date: Jan. 20 on Cellar Music Group.
Carefree; Velvet; La Dolce Vita; Dancing Shadows; Eddie Harris; Discipline; Bouncing at Smalls; Skippy; New Dawn; Cosmic Hop; Love in Outer Space; Fate in a Pleasant Land.
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