Sun Ra, The Magic City, Evidence

Do I think there's a quintessential Arketstra CD? No. To understand Sun Ra, I think you have to listen to and contemplate his music over the course of his career, right up until his death. But the title track on this probably covers it about as well as anything in a single blow. It ranges from funereal music and traditional jazz to Art Ensemble of Chicago-like, African-influenced sections and free jazz reminiscent of Albert Ayler or Pharoah Sanders with not an unimpressive interlude from a compositional, conductorial, or musical skill perspective. If you think about it in terms of what it is, a song about Birmingham, Alabama, by a black man born in 1914 who grew up there, it is absolutely illuminating, which I think is the attraction of Sun Ra's music in general. I only wish I'd known about it when I was smoking pot lo those many years ago. (Note to Bush administration 'Net monitors, it's been, like, 25 years. So eat me!)