The Mojo Collection. Various Mojo Magazine
peaks: None (UK) None (US)
Personnel: Sun Ra (clavioline, p, bass marimba, tympani, electronic celeste, Sun Harp, dragon drum); John Gilmore (ts); Pat Patrick (bs, flute, tympani); Marshall Allen (as, flute, oboe, piccolo); Ronnie Boykins (b); Danny Davis (as, flute); Robert Cummings (bass clarinet); Harry Spencer (as); Walter Miller (t); Chris Capers (t); Teddy Nance (tb); Ali Hassan (tb); Jimmi Johnson (pc); Roger Blank (pc)
Track listing: The Magic City; The Shadow World; Absract Eye; Abstract ‘I’
Running time: 45.10
Current CD: Evidence ECD 22069-2
Further listening: Other Planes Of There (1964), The Heliocentric Worlds Of Sun Ra, Vols 1 & 2 (1966, 1967)
Further reading: Space Is The Place: The Life And Times Of Sun Ra (John F. Szwed, 1997); www.dpo.uab.edu/~moudry/ (fan site); www.elrarecords.com (official)
Download: Not currently legally available
Following an apprenticeship as pianist and arranger for Fletcher Henderson’s big band in the ’40s, Sun Ra (né Herman Poole Blount) founded and led various line-ups of his own improvising big-band, Arkestra, until his death in May 1993, releasing literally hundreds of albums – mostly small editions in plain white (or hand-illustrated) covers on his own Saturn imprint – whose music ranged from manic swing and hard-bop outings to otherworldly solo synthesizer extravaganzas and bouts of collective improvisation.
Named after the promotional slogan of Ra’s hometown Birmingham, Alabama, the 27-minute title track of The Magic City is in the latter style, a breakthrough work contemporaneous with similar avant-garde explorations like Ornette Coleman’s Free Jazz and John Coltrane’s Ascension, but more fluid and obviously of a piece, the result of countless hours of development and rehearsal that enabled the Arkestra’s musicians to play in each other’s pockets even when they were navigating the most abstract sonic territory.
As producer Alton Abraham understood it, The Magic City was a city of fantasy, ‘a city without evil, a city of possibilities and beauty’, whilst in a poem of the same title, Ra himself described it as ‘that city of all natural creation … the magic of the Magi’s thought’.
The early parts find the mad-scientist whine of Ra’s clavioline in cosmic dalliance with sprays of flute and piccolo over a bed of mournful bowed-bass, before bursting into volcanic new life as the horns take over, battling above the undergrowth of high-register wind parts. Also notable is the tape-delay effect (discovered by accident a few years earlier by Ra’s recording engineer Thomas ‘Bugs’ Hunter, much to his boss’s delight) that imposes its own semblance of order on one of the percussion parts.
The three pieces that make up the album’s second side are further developments of the drum-choir style of his earlier Nubians Of Plutonia, with saxes trailing serpentine unison lines over complex polyrhythms of marimba, bongoes and tympani. Reissued several times by Ra’s cottage industry through the late ’60s, The Magic City eventually received its due acclaim when it formed part of an ambitious project which saw ABC/Impulse Records reissue ten Sun Ra albums in the early ’70s.
The Mamas And The Papas
If You Can Believe Your Eyes And Your Ears
The group who were the epitome of hippy become a commercial sensation musically, visually and commercially.
Record label: RCA
Produced: Lou Adler
Recorded: Western Recording Studios, Hollywood; late summer–autumn 1965
Released: March 1966
Chart peaks: 3 (UK) 1 (US)
Personnel: John Phillips (v, g); Denny Doherty (v); Cass Elliot (v); Michelle Phillips (v)
Track listing: Monday Monday (S); Straight Shooter; Got A Feelin’; I Call Your Name; Do You Wanna Dance; Go Where You Wanna Go (S); California Dreamin’ (S); Spanish Harlem; Somebody Groovy; Hey Girl; You Baby; The ‘In’ Crowd
Running time: 34.58
Current CD: AAMCAD11739
Further listening: Creeque Alley – The History Of The Mamas And The Papas (1991)
Further reading: Papa John (John Phillips with Jim Jerome, 1987); www.mamasandpapas.com
Download: iTunes
In his book Papa John, John Phillips described how he, Cass, Denny and Michelle auditioned for producer Lou Adler at Western Recording Studios in Hollywood while singing back-up vocals for Barry McGuire’s This Precious Time. McGuire was an old pal from the group’s Greenwich Village folk beginnings who was enjoying huge success with the protest pop of Eve Of Destruction. This was the summer of 1965 and the group was still using the name The New Journeymen. They sang California Dreamin’ and Monday Monday for Adler, and he reputedly raved: ‘Wow, I can’t believe my eyes and ears.’
Within a month they were signed, had become The Mamas And The Papas and were back recording in the same studio. They looked and sounded like nothing else before or since. Along with The Byrds and The Lovin’ Spoonful, also former folkies, The Mamas And The Papas were among the first American groups to present a challenge to the English Invasion: a year later, the whole California revival came along. By January 1966, California Dreamin’ was all over the airwaves, anticipating the Summer of Love; Phillips also wrote that other Flower Power anthem, Scott McKenzie’s San Francisco.
The Mamas And The Papas were the first public manifestation of hippiedom: their physical appearance, their flamboyant dress sense and their moral stance anticipated the climate; outlandish rich kids living in Bel Air. All four of their albums are as strong as their debut, and each one maintained the high standard of John Phillips’ songwriting. Cass usually pulled a favourite cover version out of her repertoire (Dedicated To The One I Love is, perhaps, the best known), but the crowning glory was the finest production that Los Angeles could offer, a clear and warm sound played by the same team of top-flight sessionmen on each record.
That The Mamas And The Papas’ story ended in turmoil, strife and eventually the death of Cass Elliot, after the group split in 1968, was almost inevitable given the love/hate tensions between them and an extraordinary drug intake. As is often the way, the sweetest music sprang from the darkest circumstances.
The Monks
Black Monk Time
Five GIs dressed as monks make garage rock in Germany. Strangely obscurity ensues.
Record label: Polydor
Produced: Jimmy Bowien
Recorded: Polydor Studios, Koln, Germany; November 1965
Released: March 1966
Chart peaks: None (UK) None (US)
Personnel: Gary Burger (g, v); Larry Clark (o); Dave Day (banjo); Roger Johnston (d); Eddie Shaw (b)
Track listing: Monk Time; Shut Up; Boys Are Boys And Girls Are Choice; Higgle-Dy Piggle-Dy; I Hate You; Oh, How To Do Now; Complication; We Do Wie Du; Drunken Maria; Love Came Tumblin’ Down; Blast Off!; That’s My Girl
Running time: 29.46
Current CD: Repertoire US import
Further listening: Five Upstart Americans (1999) – sessions recorded