Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Spooky? Quirky? Soulful? How about Sublime! , April 19, 2008
Studio recorded in 1970, New York, with the small gathering of Sun Ra, John Gilmore, Danny Davis and Stafford James, Night of the Purple Moon is a unique recording all about Sun Ra's fantastic, yet quiet, meditations. Just recently reissued on CD, the original LP's eleven songs have been augmented by three 60's home recordings of Sun Ra on electric piano and an alternate take of Love in Outer Space.
About half of this collection is Ra, solo, sweetly thinking on his Rocksichord, Mini-Moog or electric piano, while the other half features the quartet. Gilmore plays a wonderfully strong, classic tenor sax on Impromptu Festival, yet works as drummer for the rest, with James backing on electric bass. Davis dominates with alto sax on A Bird's Eye View Of Man's World and the catchy opener, Sun-Earth Rock, which you might find yourself humming throughout the day. On others he variously plays clarinet, flute and bongos.
Purple Moon is not Big Band Arkestra in a showy mood, with explosions, tsunamis and choral singing. In fact, there are no vocals. Mr. Ra conducts this little fireside chat through music alone. It's like his mind is wired to yours. Put it on and you will feel him with you, fire in his eyes, joy in his heart, and love in his soul. The moon may even look purple.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Otherworldly beauty , May 29, 2008
I once heard of a physics class that the professor described as the physics of the bits of stuff that DON'T go down the drain when you pull the stopper. How they end up spinning off in their own difficult to describe dynamics of motion skirting but never joining the curve of the flow, was the topic.
Sun Ra's style of music reminds of this. Sun Ra's music of topic is the dynamics of those musical elements that don't ease in with the flow.
This record, however, has some of his most bluesy and accessible pieces. Many of the pieces are solo keyboard bits, and stand alone as great creative improvs, the last three are tacked on from home recordings 10 years earlier, and are very beautiful.
The band bits, are of a much stripped down band. For my money this allows more focus to be placed on Sunny's keys, and he fills in the space with wonderous chordal splashes, noisy flourishes, and the usual bedlam that is the trademark of the genius from another world.
I've you've been curious about Sun Ra but didn't know what to buy (he released something like 20 albums in 1978 alone!) this is a great place to start. It's Dreamy, inspiring, and at times danceable!
And nothing much like anything else he recorded.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
My First Sun Ra Experience is Captivating and Charming, August 30, 2008
Now that I finally got around to hearing Sun Ra, I wonder where he's been my whole life. I thoroughly enjoyed this record. In addition to the album being unique and accessable, it is quirky which makes the listener feel as though he is part of a small esoteric club of like minded people, kind of like listening to Daniel Johnston or in my experience appreciating the brilliant pyschedilic pop of the beach boys. Sun Ra's keyboard sounds otherworldy as it is in tone and the rhythms here are fascinating and original. I am sure to pick up more Sun Ra. If you are new to his music then I recommend that this is a good place to start.
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by Sun Ra 
