This month we have a special edition of Favorites.  This month DeadSun goes solo with a review for an artist that really deserves to be in the Legends or Classic's series but we decided to let DeadSun dedicate this month's Favorite's feature to one of his favorite recordings from this legend. 

It isn't a difficult task to, through the application of the intellect, identify the benefits brought to us by an immersion into the arts--- be it music, prose, poetry, painting, sculpting, and so on. 

For each of us who fall into this category, we will--- perhaps four, maybe five times during the course of our lives--- stumble upon the work of an artist that is able to communicate with our minds in a language that transcends the uttered word. Regardless of the medium which it is presented in, it provokes the senses and the cognitive reflex in a way that lies beyond the reach of our understanding. It bypasses the filter of the steely intellect, and stirs profound reactions within us. 

Speaking only for myself, one such exceedingly rare artist is John Coltrane--- and the particular work in question is "Sun Ship". 

Recorded on August 26th, 1965, at RCA Victor studios, "Sun Ship" features John Coltrane on tenor sax, McCoy Tyner on piano, Jimmy Garrison on bass, and the ingenious percussionist Elvin Jones at the drum kit--- arguably the greatest and most accomplished quartet that John Coltrane ever assembled. The years falling in between 1955 and 1967 are almost universally regarded as the period during which John Coltrane released the body of work that--- literally--- revolutioned jazz, and ultimately Western music itself. I believe this would not have been accomplished were it not for the rhythm section that sat in--- the same players--- for a straight four years of those recording sessions and gigs. By 1965, this quartet had developed a musical intuitiveness toward one another that bordered on a precognitive gnosis--- as if sixteen limbs were functioning by way of the same mind. The months within and around 1965 yielded sessions like "A Love Supreme", "Meditations", and "Ascension". Not only was Coltrane's creative element whirring in a godly overdrive, but it was prolific in a way that was (and remains) virtually without precedent in modern music.

"Sun Ship" was--- from a perspective of conventional attitudes toward musical form, rhythm, dynamics, and tonality--- aeons ahead of its own time, and I venture to say that we in the present have yet to catch up with it. "Sun Ship" is the great and terrible musical storm of the century; with Jones' dynamic, free tempo fills providing the peels of thunder, Garrison's frenetic plucking the downpour of hail and rain, Tyner's hard chordal passages the touchdown of atmospheric electricity, and Coltrane's tenor sax the narrative conciousness. The opening track rushes in with sonic intensity, and whereas (the works of) Miles Davis revolutioned the intellect of the artform, it can be said that the sonic free forms explored by Coltrane in "Sun Ship" (et al) revolutionized the spiritual dimension which clearly courses through the veins, to a greater or lesser degree, of not merely jazz, but within all music.

This is not a recording for the crude ear. An initial, half-hearted spin will often strike the novice listener as messy, chaotic scalework--- a sloppy free for all. Several uninterrupted listens reveal a brilliant and deliberate mastery over conflicting structures and seemingly incompatible tempi. Polyrhythmic flutters overlap, Coltrane's augmented scales clash abrasively but purposefully against Garrison's pizzicato counter-strikes, and Elvin Jones conducts the entire beast of rhythmic savagery with a dynamism and confidence that utterly stupefies the brain. Elvin Jones' work with John Coltrane on "Sun Ship" stands as an immoveable monument that explains his legendary status among drummers of every age and style. This is music for its own sake and expression. The music heard is not only music as a profound artform--- it is the quintessence of music in its most exalted state, faithfully and sincerely crafted to brim with every redeemable quality we credit to music. From the opening, relentless tumult of the title track, to the wind-down tempo and strummed final, triple stop on Garrison's bass--- "Sun Ship" is a journey from start to finish.

Whatever your stylistic preferences are--- be it Rock, Classical, Blues, Hard Rock, Metal, Punk, Ska, Country, Electronica--- if you embrace music as an artform, then I am here to encourage you to acquire this recording, along with any other of Coltrane's works from that period (circa 1965). He was truly one of the most profound musical visionaries of the 20th century. John Coltrane's influence has taken root within artists of every caliber and grade. Based upon my own estimations of what music ideally means and represents, "Sun Ship" approaches the divine.

It is the music made in both heaven and hell.

Until next month, this is DS, signing off.

Listen to samples and Purchase this CD online

Tracks:
1.) Sun Ship 6:12
2.) Dearly Beloved 6:27
3.) Amen 8:16
4.) Attaining 11:26
5.) Ascent 10:10