Lanquidity

Released

The decades-long and thoroughly deranged catalogue of Sun Ra can be deeply forbidding, but if there’s one good beginner’s starting point it’s this from 1978. Yes, it’s consistently out of tune, unpredictable, and irregular in every direction, but it’s rooted in a loose and lovely funk sensibility that anyone with an appreciation for head nod beats can let themselves get drawn into. Some of it, like “That’s how I Feel,” could almost be mistaken for NORMAL music, and all of it, bizarrely, manages to prefigure trip hop a quarter century early and with entirely organic playing. But once those grooves have got you, you’ll find yourself in the weird world of Sun Ra, and gradually getting acclimatised to the glorious illogic that underpins the rest of his work.

Joe Muggs

Suggestions
Light as a Feather cover

Light as a Feather

Return to Forever, Chick Corea
Escape the Flames cover

Escape the Flames

Binker & Moses
Speckly cover

Speckly

Shrimp Boat
Lontano cover

Lontano

Tomasz Stańko Quartet
Sundur cover

Sundur

Pascal Pinon
Dwell Time cover

Dwell Time

Håkon Kornstad
Let's Call This... cover

Let's Call This...

Ingrid Laubrock, Liam Noble
Tyyni cover

Tyyni

Cucina Povera