Sun Ra offer from Sundazed Records

[felser]

I have no stake in the game, but this looks like a great deal for those who are interested, 5 Sun Ra LP's and a Sundazed Tote bag for $60:

https://sundazed.com/five-lp-sun-ra-bundle-a-sundazed-tote-bag-for-60.aspx

[Rabshakeh]

It really interests me how Sun Ra has been defanged in the popular culture. 

Some sort of pivot happened around 2010. Where he went from being perceived as an exemplar of the avant-garde that Sonic Youth was going to tell you about, to being someone whose work you could use to sell tote bags. The focus has also shifted quite radically away from his New York era records that used to define him in wider culture. 

Edited yesterday at 07:44 AM by Rabshakeh

[jazzbo]

The estate has made smart moves and marketing has been well-applied. The fact that the releases and re-releases have sounded so darned good has gotten me to buy and replace earlier copies (made a few new fans that way by giving earlier editions away). I think the fact that the Arkestra was still active and growing its own post-Sonny following helped. 

Is the avant=garde music of jazz itself more popular, slowly growing a fan base, as well? Perhaps. I am totally out of the jazz scene, I'm not young and really know no jazz fans or many jazz fans outside of forums.

[Rabshakeh]

1 hour ago, jazzbo said:

Is the avant=garde music of jazz itself more popular, slowly growing a fan base, as well? Perhaps. I am totally out of the jazz scene, I'm not young and really know no jazz fans or many jazz fans outside of forums.

I think that what has happened is that Pharaoh Sanders, Alice Coltrane, Archie Shepp and Sun Ra how now become very mainstream as "Spiritual Jazz", along with a few other names that younger listeners regard as similar, like Dorothy Ashby. I know lots of younger people for whom those artists represent their main experience of jazz. 

It is quite specific periods for each artist, mostly corresponding to their time on Impulse! or in the case of Sun Ra, his move towards less obviously extreme music, and particularly the Languidity, Disco 3000 and Nuclear War records. So no ESP or BYG stuff.

I get the sense that these records have an aura of "conscious" afro-centric spirituality with good visuals that appeal to the Instagram and tiktok creators, but they also have a transgressive edge from the fact that they are associated with the avant-garde, without actually being difficult to listen to.

I don't get the sense that the wider avantgarde jazz is really growing at all. I don't think these people enjoying Alice Coltrane's meditation records are checking out Frank Wright or Lester Bowie, let alone more recent figures like Gustafsson etc.

The three exemplary figures of the avantgarde back when I got into the music: John Coltrane, Don Cherry, and for other listeners, John Zorn, seem to be much less famous with younger people than they were before. I am always a bit shocked at the collapse in name recognition for Cherry in particular.

More shockingly, I have come across really quite a number of people in both real life and on the internet who profess to like avantgarde jazz, who turn up their nose up at Coltrane. I think it is because the name Coltrane is too widely known and they, in their ignorance, mistakenly regard Coltrane as music for normies. The famous cover of "My Favorite Things" seems to get mentioned as an example of creative compromise or selling out, which is obviously completely bizarre. Ascension, which for anyone learned about this music retrospectively in the text based media era was the obvious example of an avantgarde jazz record, seems to be MIA in modern discourse. 

I think a lot of the reason for this is that the interest in these records is spurred by social media. I.e. the growth of interest in these artists is coming in large part from short form videos where an attractive young person shows you his or her "Five essential spiritual jazz records that just hit different" and then pulls out records whilst nodding. It is generally the same records on Impulse!. That is partly because the algorithm incentivises picking the same records (the more people that mention a specific record the more likely the video is to trend) but also partly because Alice Coltrane and Pharaoh Sanders and Sun Ra records look otherworldly and cosmic. A lot of the people making these videos appear to just be recycling the same themes, so there isn't much way to break their narratives.

That may explain why the previously talismanic records are retreating: John Coltrane records just have photographs of him looking serious, Don Cherry records look a bit messy and John Zorn is not handsome and his records are all on CD. 

As a separate phenomenon, I have also come across increasing recognition of Evan Parker, Peter Brotzmann and Anthony Braxton, although typically not connected to actually listening to their music. I think that these three get held up online as "really extreme" or "really experimental", which adds up to name recognition and some curiousity. I went to see e.g. Parker or Brotzmann (RIP) recently and the gigs were full of curious younger people who hadn't actually listened to the records but we're excited, often having travelled quite far, listening in rapt attention. Again, I think that this reflects the fact that these people's records are showing up on Instagram and Tiktok as examples of the most avant-garde or experimental jazz. 

I don't think that any of this is really a sign of wider interest though, any more than the resurgence of interest in Gil Scott-Heron a few years ago heralded a growth of interest in 1970s soul and funk. It is just an intersection of politics, youth culture, nice looking covers and short form video.

Finally, I should add that these "young" people are in their 30s. In generational terms the popularity of these records is strictly a millennial thing. I have seen no sign whatsoever that listeners under 25 are getting into this music. 

Edited yesterday at 11:50 AM by Rabshakeh

[jazzbo]

Thanks for that. This is a world that I have no experience with, living out in the woods in an area where country music and radio pop seem to be what younger persons are aware of, and only those genres, and being someone who has a flip phone that does not connect to the internet and zero interest in watching youtube or other videos or reading blogs etc. 

[Stompin at the Savoy]

1 hour ago, jazzbo said:

Thanks for that. This is a world that I have no experience with, living out in the woods in an area where country music and radio pop seem to be what younger persons are aware of, and only those genres, and being someone who has a flip phone that does not connect to the internet and zero interest in watching youtube or other videos or reading blogs etc. 

Maybe partly because my eyesight is not great but I have never understood the appeal of accessing the internet on a smartphone.  I have an iphone and love it because it's a phone, an alarm clock/stop-watch, a decent camera, a compass, navigation system for car, an ok music player in a pinch with headphones, etc.  But I don't generally look at things like photos or even mail on the phone.  If I take photos I look at them on a pc.  Email - pc. Social media - pc.  You-tube and spotify - pc.  Newspapers - pc. Those phone screens are too small, the speaker sound is horrible, and it's hard to maintain good posture while using them.  If I'm gonna squint I'll squint at something bigger like a biggish monitor.     

Leaving the device aside, I agree with you about all the distraction of phone/social media etc life.  These last few years I have spent so much time doom-scrolling.  Recently I got very fed up with being over-stimulated and frustrated and have begun to go back to my old, pre-internet habits of reading books all the time.  Stories are good entertainment and they provide a comforting way for us to see a bigger picture from a lofty vantage point where the beginning, middle and end are available to us, unlike our moment to moment experience which is just now and where the endings of things are unknown.

[mjazzg]

4 hours ago, Rabshakeh said:

I think that what has happened is that Pharaoh Sanders, Alice Coltrane, Archie Shepp and Sun Ra how now become very mainstream as "Spiritual Jazz", along with a few other names that younger listeners regard as similar, like Dorothy Ashby. I know lots of younger people for whom those artists represent their main experience of jazz. 

It is quite specific periods for each artist, mostly corresponding to their time on Impulse! or in the case of Sun Ra, his move towards less obviously extreme music, and particularly the Languidity, Disco 3000 and Nuclear War records. So no ESP or BYG stuff.

I get the sense that these records have an aura of "conscious" afro-centric spirituality with good visuals that appeal to the Instagram and tiktok creators, but they also have a transgressive edge from the fact that they are associated with the avant-garde, without actually being difficult to listen to.

I don't get the sense that the wider avantgarde jazz is really growing at all. I don't think these people enjoying Alice Coltrane's meditation records are checking out Frank Wright or Lester Bowie, let alone more recent figures like Gustafsson etc.

The three exemplary figures of the avantgarde back when I got into the music: John Coltrane, Don Cherry, and for other listeners, John Zorn, seem to be much less famous with younger people than they were before. I am always a bit shocked at the collapse in name recognition for Cherry in particular.

More shockingly, I have come across really quite a number of people in both real life and on the internet who profess to like avantgarde jazz, who turn up their nose up at Coltrane. I think it is because the name Coltrane is too widely known and they, in their ignorance, mistakenly regard Coltrane as music for normies. The famous cover of "My Favorite Things" seems to get mentioned as an example of creative compromise or selling out, which is obviously completely bizarre. Ascension, which for anyone learned about this music retrospectively in the text based media era was the obvious example of an avantgarde jazz record, seems to be MIA in modern discourse. 

I think a lot of the reason for this is that the interest in these records is spurred by social media. I.e. the growth of interest in these artists is coming in large part from short form videos where an attractive young person shows you his or her "Five essential spiritual jazz records that just hit different" and then pulls out records whilst nodding. It is generally the same records on Impulse!. That is partly because the algorithm incentivises picking the same records (the more people that mention a specific record the more likely the video is to trend) but also partly because Alice Coltrane and Pharaoh Sanders and Sun Ra records look otherworldly and cosmic. A lot of the people making these videos appear to just be recycling the same themes, so there isn't much way to break their narratives.

That may explain why the previously talismanic records are retreating: John Coltrane records just have photographs of him looking serious, Don Cherry records look a bit messy and John Zorn is not handsome and his records are all on CD. 

As a separate phenomenon, I have also come across increasing recognition of Evan Parker, Peter Brotzmann and Anthony Braxton, although typically not connected to actually listening to their music. I think that these three get held up online as "really extreme" or "really experimental", which adds up to name recognition and some curiousity. I went to see e.g. Parker or Brotzmann (RIP) recently and the gigs were full of curious younger people who hadn't actually listened to the records but we're excited, often having travelled quite far, listening in rapt attention. Again, I think that this reflects the fact that these people's records are showing up on Instagram and Tiktok as examples of the most avant-garde or experimental jazz. 

I don't think that any of this is really a sign of wider interest though, any more than the resurgence of interest in Gil Scott-Heron a few years ago heralded a growth of interest in 1970s soul and funk. It is just an intersection of politics, youth culture, nice looking covers and short form video.

Finally, I should add that these "young" people are in their 30s. In generational terms the popularity of these records is strictly a millennial thing. I have seen no sign whatsoever that listeners under 25 are getting into this music. 

Young people listening rapt to EP and PB, whatever next, that's Oto for you!

Flippancy aside, I think you hit several nails squarely on the head. Alice as the most hip of the Coltranes is very apparent I think.

I'm listening to Kahil El'Zabar at the moment. Someone else whose recognition levels in the east of Dalston population is high. Deservedly so, and I think a positive example of how a younger audience can connect to someone who's most definitely paid his dues, several times over and deserves the benefits.

[Pim]

I think you made the right analysis @Rabshakeh: I see the same things. The so called spiritual jazz movement seems to do well with a younger generation and especially artists like Pharoah Sanders and Alice Coltrane are popular. When I attended an Evan Parker gig in Gent there we're also quite some younger people that seamed to be there mostly because they wanted to drink a beer and hear what this guy was all about. I don't think they actually had any of his records or something like that but they we're interested in some way. In my experience the Scandinavian jazz scene seems to attract younger people also: when I saw groups like Atomic and The Thing there we're more people of my generation (born in the '90's) then let's say the times I saw Bennie Golson or Sonny Rollins.

I have mixed feelings about it. I think a part of them is sincerely interested in the music and another part is mostly doing it because they feel hip/part of a cultural minority/misplaced intellectual feelings etc. I'm skeptic about peoples behaviour trough social media as well. Before you know it some hipster publishes a list of 30 must hear freejazz records without including Anthony Braxton, Steve Lacy, Sam Rivers, Cecil Taylor or as you mentioned the great John Coltrane. When their interest is sincere: I feel so happy the music gets more interest. When their interest is shallow: please stay away.

[Holy Ghost]

This has been an excellent thread to read.👍Very much enjoyed reading everyone's insights.

 

[Dub Modal]

Great deal, almost half price. Not a bad album among the bunch. 

I wish we got more of the Matthew Halsall, El'Zabar, et al type gigs. Sadly they only come around rarely. Shows at the type of venues they'd perform at trend more straight ahead here. Looking at El'Zabar's 2026 tour dates, the closest stop was Baltimore which is an ugly 5 hour drive. 

[Rabshakeh]

El'Zabar is putting serious time in for East London, it seems. He plays three or four times a year. 

[pglbook]

All very good and valid points regarding the increased popularity of Sun Ra.

I think that the major factor in Sun Ra's increased "popularity" has been the increased availability of his music on CDs and records. 30 years ago it was extremely hard, with a few exceptions, to find any Sun Ra records or CDs. But, beginning with the Evidence CD reissues in the 1990s, a slow trickle of Sun Ra releases has turned into an avalanche whereby presently almost his entire prodigious musical output is readily available in one form or another. And in much improved sound quality, thanks to improved technology. 

Of course, availability of music does not always equal sales and popularity. But, in Sun Ra's case, the increased availability of his music has resulted in a kind of Sun Ra renaissance in the past 10 years due to some of the factors noted by Rabshakeh. However, I am not sure I would put any of Sun Ra's music in the "spiritual jazz" category and tie the increased interest in his music to an increased interest in spiritual jazz. Sun Ra's more "mainstream" albums, like Liquidity, will always have a bigger mass appeal than his more cacophonic "out there" albums. That will always be the case since avant- garde jazz in general appeals to a much smaller demographic. 

I think that, in Sun Ra's case, people who were curious about Sun Ra's mystique and aura, were finally able to listen to the music due to its ready availability and they liked what they heard. 

I always say that there is not one Sun Ra but many Sun Ras. Part of his genius was the ability to always move forward and transform his music. There are as many Sun Ra styles as Sun Ra albums. And it only makes sese that more people will be attracted to his more "mainstream" style. But I do not relate those albums to spiritual jazz and do not think that his increased popularity is a result of the spiritual jazz crowd suddenly "discovering" Sun Ra. I may be wrong of course, but it is a very interesting conversation to have about the Sun Ra "phenomena" of the past decade.

 

 

Edited 1 hour ago by pglbook

[Niko]

Agreed that Sun Ra is not spiritual jazz, and agreed that his popularity was held back by the fact that his work on famous labels Impulse and ESP is so much less accessible than other periods of his work like Lanquidity or the Chicago years as exemplified by Jazz in Silhouette, or the current edition of his band

Edited 1 hour ago by Niko