John ColtraneFeaturing: Pharoah Sanders, Archie Shepp, John Tchicai, Marion Brown, Jimmy Garrison, Elvin Jones, McCoy Tyner
Ascension (LP)
condition (record/cover): VG+ (marks not affecting play) / VG+ (light spine and general wear)
Gatefold sleeve.
June 1965: John Coltrane assembles eleven musicians - Pharoah Sanders, Archie Shepp, Marion Brown, John Tchicai, Freddie Hubbard, Dewey Johnson and more - and burns the house down in one continuous, ecstatic conflagration. The big-band answer to Ornette's Free Jazz, and the moment the avant-garde received its official blessing from the most respected musician in jazz: after Ascension, nobody could call the new thing a fringe. Ensemble roars alternate with solo flights, the whole thing structured like a series of waves hitting the same shore harder each time. Overwhelming by design, and one of the decade's true monuments. US Impulse! pressing.
