Crucial, preposterous David Axelrod!
Composed and arranged by the maestro, a psychedelic garage-rock opera, sung in Latin, with Gregorian chant, pipe organ, lashings of fuzz guitar, strings and horns.
A version of the opener Kyrie Eleison famously featured in the soundtrack for Easy Rider, accompanying several scenes.
This definitive reissue was mastered by Kevin Gray using the original tapes.

Heavy, grooving, excursive, Afro-Latin jazz to usher in the seventies, with two bassists — Cecil McBee and Stanley Clarke — and three drummers, in Norman Connors, Billy Hart, and Lawrence Killian. Fronting alongside Hannibal Marvin Peterson and Carlos Garnett, Sanders solos magnificently.
‘Verve By Request.’ Crucial Pharoah.

Excursions and meditations on an eighteenth century organ tuned to pure thirds, entailing a slightly harsh intonation exploited here to evoke the hostile climate of the Potenza valley during winter and autumn.
‘The sound of the organ with the register of the flute returns a particularly sweet and penetrating sound but, at the same time, a very complex timbre with intricate harmonic texture, given the numerous fluctuations and beats. The warm tones of the organ reflect the good and welcoming souls of the people who inhabit these lands. The absence of dynamics inside the instrument allows the listener to focus and understand the harmonic texture and timbral differences between the various notes more clearly.’
With trombone, trumpet, saxophone, and effects.

A lovely set from 1965 — taking its own path away from Fire Music, but forwards nonetheless — featuring the under-rated pianist Georges Arvanitas, and the drummer James Black, trumping his brilliant contributions to the Live At Pep’s sessions.
Bamboo Flute Blues and Satie’s First Gymnopedie are ravishing stand-outs.
‘Verve By Request.’

Banging, key Messengers. Blakey is on fire; Shorter is vicious.
Hubbard bows out of this line-up with a passionate tribute to the Congress of Racial Equality.
Classic Vinyl Series.

Music by Freddie Perren and Fonce Mizell; songs performed by Edwin Starr.
With Easin’ In.

1964 masterwork with Freddie Hubbard, Herbie, Elvin Jones and Ron Carter, tersely melding avant, modal and bop. “Wild flowers and strange, dimly-seen shapes… I was thinking of things like witch burnings, too.”

Bringing the funk in 1968, with George Benson, Lonnie Smith, Blue Mitchell, and Leo Morris (who became Idris Muhammed)... not forgetting Dapper Dan.

Recorded in Paris, 1965, at the time of the Vietnam peace talks. ‘Donald Byrd occasionally played with us at the Blue Note, so he came in and helped produce the record.’

Melting, copybook Lovers Rock from 1977.
Willie Lindo, Harold Butler Robbie Lyn and co at Federal. Marcia Griffiths on backing vocals. A classy Waiting In Vain.