Sun Ra & His Intergalactic Arkestra – Sleeping Beauty (1979)

This is the great late-night Sun Ra chillout album you never knew about. The band had been working in a more groove-oriented setting off and on for over a year, as evidenced by the albums “Lanquidity” and “On Jupiter”, with both featuring prominent electric bass and electric guitar.

“Sleeping Beauty” picks up right where “On Jupiter” left off, with the gentle, swaying “Springtime Again” echoing the same mellow vibe of “Seductive Fantasy” from “On Jupiter”. A skittering intro coalesces as different instruments pick up bits of the melody, which is then fully expressed by the horn section and ensemble vocals. It’s a simple two-chord vamp, with beautiful solos that seem to embody the reawakening and rebirth of springtime.

“The Door of the Cosmos” starts with a gospel-like chant and handclaps, with comments from Ra’s electric piano and electric guitar. A strong bassline enters, very reminiscent of “A Love Supreme, Pt. 1: Acknowledgement,” but the accompanying chant celebrates the mysteries of the unknown rather than the universal truth of “A Love Supreme”. This track builds in intensity, but never loses its groove or becomes nearly as raucous as the Arkestra is sometimes known for.

“Sleeping Beauty” is the album centerpiece, taking up all of side two. Ra’s beautiful electric piano gets things rolling, and the band falls into a peaceful groove before the vocals enter, led by the wonderful June Tyson.

These songs are all built on the simplest of structures, and the playing from everyone is understated and sublime. “Sleeping Beauty” is truly a high point in an unwieldy discography, and something of an anomaly at the same time. There’s a good reason copies of this album go for several hundred dollars on the collector’s market, but it really deserves a proper release so more people can hear it. Outstanding.

 

Tracklist:          

A1		Springtime Again	9:17
A2		Door Of The Cosmos	9:00
B		Sleeping Beauty	11:51

 

Sun Ra & His Intergalactic Arkestra – Sleeping Beauty (1979)

(224 kbps, cover art included)

Sun Ra & His Intergalactic Arkestra – Sleeping Beauty (1979)

This is the great late-night Sun Ra chillout album you never knew about. The band had been working in a more groove-oriented setting off and on for over a year, as evidenced by the albums “Lanquidity” and “On Jupiter”, with both featuring prominent electric bass and electric guitar.

“Sleeping Beauty” picks up right where “On Jupiter” left off, with the gentle, swaying “Springtime Again” echoing the same mellow vibe of “Seductive Fantasy” from “On Jupiter”. A skittering intro coalesces as different instruments pick up bits of the melody, which is then fully expressed by the horn section and ensemble vocals. It’s a simple two-chord vamp, with beautiful solos that seem to embody the reawakening and rebirth of springtime.

“The Door of the Cosmos” starts with a gospel-like chant and handclaps, with comments from Ra’s electric piano and electric guitar. A strong bassline enters, very reminiscent of “A Love Supreme, Pt. 1: Acknowledgement,” but the accompanying chant celebrates the mysteries of the unknown rather than the universal truth of “A Love Supreme”. This track builds in intensity, but never loses its groove or becomes nearly as raucous as the Arkestra is sometimes known for.

“Sleeping Beauty” is the album centerpiece, taking up all of side two. Ra’s beautiful electric piano gets things rolling, and the band falls into a peaceful groove before the vocals enter, led by the wonderful June Tyson.

These songs are all built on the simplest of structures, and the playing from everyone is understated and sublime. “Sleeping Beauty” is truly a high point in an unwieldy discography, and something of an anomaly at the same time. There’s a good reason copies of this album go for several hundred dollars on the collector’s market, but it really deserves a proper release so more people can hear it. Outstanding.

 

Tracklist:          

A1		Springtime Again	9:17
A2		Door Of The Cosmos	9:00
B		Sleeping Beauty	11:51

 

Sun Ra & His Intergalactic Arkestra – Sleeping Beauty (1979)

(224 kbps, cover art included)

VA – The Iron Muse (Topic, 1993)

This 1993 Topic release is an expanded reissue of the label’s original 1956 LP. “Iron Muse” was the first of its kind, a collection of folk music derived almost exclusively from the experiences of industrial workers in the north of England.

The folk tradition of rural and historical Great Britain was well known and documented. But to think that the specific hardships and experiences of the country’s industrial workers would be chronicled in a similar way — through heartfelt lyrics and playing — was at first a bit odd. It took the work of famous folklorist A.L. Lloyd to change that opinion. The work of miners, weavers, and the like had already become fertile ground for song. But Lloyd went inside blazing steel mills, onto hard iron railways, and into dank boiler rooms in search of the workers’ music and their voices.

What he found was Maureen Craik’s stark, a cappella rendering of the strike lament “Durham Lockout” and Louis Killen’s accented, fiddle-led (and still relevant) “Aw Wish Pay Friday Would Come.” The hardscrabble life of a miner was described with unflinching detail in “Blackleg Miners,” their frighteningly protracted existence recorded in the brief, powerful “Auchengeich Disaster”. Much of the material on “Iron Muse” drew melody from the traditional canon. However, the songs were cast in a darker hue by the soot and bad lighting of the industrial towns. The countryside’s music could be pastoral, but also very dark; the city folk seemed to dwell on the latter trait. Strikes, class warfare, worksite disasters, and the unending need (desire) for wages provided lyrical fodder for “Iron Muse”, but it was the humanity and emotions behind the daily grind that really drove the songs. The occasional reel (especially “Sandgate Girl’s Lament/Elsie Marley”) provided a respite as brief and wonderful as a Sunday night backroom dance, helping the album paint a vivid picture of life inside the industrial towns and add a new chapter to the history book of traditional folk music.

Fresh link:

VA – The Iron Muse (Topic, 1993) (192 kbps, front & back cover inclueded)