The Creator had a Master Plan(et Rock)

 

I have an enormous, almost obsessive, appetite for new music. Hunting for everything I can find featuring a musician, producer or style that caught my ear is a habit that probably keeps me from really giving half the attention and listening time deserved by records that come my way. Even so, there are albums, artists and songs that I always go back to, the records that have wound up holding special places (roles?) in my listening and life. Pharoah Sanders has been near the top of that list for a long time, since F first introduced me to the saxophone legend as teenager (by giving me a Best Of Pharoah Sanders double LP that I still treasure). 

Maybe it's really some COVID era awareness of mortality, but it feels like there been a shocking number of musicians that I've been moved and influenced by who have passed away in the last two or three years. It still felt especially tragic though when I heard the news that Pharoah Sanders had died last week. From his youngest days playing in Coltrane's group, to the mystical classics he released as a leader, into his early 80s, Sanders was turning up in surprising places and influencing new waves of artists. He released a very well received new album last year collaborating with a younger electronic musician and a new generation of jazz artists have recently come up, deeply drawing from hip hop roots and profoundly influenced by Sanders, giving his generation of spiritual and free jazz legends their due. Seems like he deserved more time with the new flowers that were flowing his way.

I'm no expert on Pharoah Sanders or jazz. These obituaries from the Guardian and Artforum that I ran into can fill in the backstory far better than I would. I can tell you that when I feel like things are falling apart, when I'm losing hope, when I'm lost or or need to convince myself that a new direction might still be possible, a Pharoah Sanders record goes onto the stereo. No one would accuse me of being a very religious person, but when when Leon Thomas begins to sing The Creator Has A Master Plan, something magical happens and I can believe that peace and happiness might be possible or even inevitable. Sanders' playing and compositions could unravel into loud wild bursts of passion, but that noise was the passion of church, spirit and celebration. The music remained deeply positive, spiritual and concerned for the wellbeing of his people, Africa, and the world. Pharoah's saxophone tones have never been as intricate or controlled as many of the other great players, but they have an instantly recognizable strength and warmth. From Richard Williams' Guardian obit:

When asked to explain the philosophy behind the music that [Amiri] Baraka described as “long tissues of sounded emotion”, he replied: “I was just trying to see if I could play a pretty note, a pretty sound.” In later years, those who arrived at his concerts expecting the white-bearded figure to produce the squalls of sound that characterised Coltrane’s late period were often surprised by the gentleness with which he could enunciate a ballad. “When I’m trying to play music,” he said, “I’m telling the truth about myself.”

A few weeks earlier, my sister received some difficult and traumatic news and I told her I'd share some music that helps me through hard times. Sanders was, of course, the first artist I thought of to send her way. "Music is the healing force of the universe," as Albert Ayler once put it. (Ayler also famously tried to explain the continuity -and differences- between this saxophone holy trinity, saying: "Trane was the father, Pharoah was the son, and I am the Holy Ghost.")

Nothing fancy today. I didn't have time to mess with any vinyl (although I'd like to get to some PS records soon). But hearing that the world had lost him, I wanted to quickly share something- in tribute to a legend whose music has given me a lot and for friends and family that I know that could use some of the magic that his saxophone and spirit offered.

Pharoah Sanders – Karma

Impulse! – UCCI-9127, AS-9181

CD, Album, Reissue, Remastered, Paper Sleeve

Japan, 2007 (First released 1969)

info

1969's Karma LP contains Pharoah Sanders' best known song, the brilliant (and half hour long) The Creator Has A Master Plan. If you have one Pharoah Sanders record, it's probably this. Too obvious of an album to share? Maybe, but I had it ready to go, it's one of the records I go back most often in life, and if any of you *haven't* listened to it before, then I figured there was a chance I would significantly improve your life in a single post! This is a Japanese CD edition from 2007. 

Tracklist

1 The Creator Has A Master Plan         32:45
2 Colors                                                    5:36

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23 Skidoo – Dawning

Virgin – VSCDT 1771

CD, Single, UK, 2000

info

If Karma is an obvious, early classic from Pharoah Sanders, here's something from later in life that highlights his continued experimentation, collaboration and incorporating of new musical strains.

23 Skidoo had gone 16 years since their last album by the time they released this single, Dawning, featuring Pharoah Sanders. The British band had formed in 1979 and rapidly evolved from playing post-punk funk to incorporating eastern percussion, samples and breakbeats, experimental hip hop, ambient noise and more. After a lengthy break, they returned with a self titled LP for Virgin in 2000. The album was maybe more sedate than their brilliant early 80s albums and veered toward some of the "trip hop" styles that had become popular (and that their earlier records had surely influenced). Dawning, the lead track on this CD single, was one of two collaborations with Pharoah Sanders included on that LP. It's a good song, built around a nice jazz loop with piano (and the crackle of vinyl) made even better when joined by Sanders. His sax is immediately recognizable when it enters the mix and adds a warmth that I never would have expected from a 23 Skidoo song. (I only recently noticed that the Pharoah Sanders contributions were recorded at Cottonbelly Studio in NY, presumably the same studio run by Stuart Matthewman of Sade. More on him soon!)

The Dawning single also includes Ayu (pulled from the same album in a slightly different edit I believe) and non-album cut Coded Heat (where at one point it sounds like 23 Skidoo is trying out their impression of the Take Me To The Mardi Gras break). As a little bonus I also included Pyramid Stomp, an unreleased third collaboration with Pharoah Sanders that 23 Skidoo wound up sharing years ago as an MP3 download on their (now defunct) website. Not as great as Dawning, but an interesting track- you get to hear Sanders play over an upbeat sort of Krautrock disco jam(?). Fun, in a way that I wouldn't usually expect of either Sanders or 23 Skidoo.

Tracklist
1 Dawning (feat. Pharoah Sanders)                    6:04
2 Coded Heat                                                      5:14
3 Ayu                                                                      8:22

+ bonus

1      Pyramid Stomp (feat. Pharoah Sanders)         8:02

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I hope this gives someone a little of the peace that I've taken from it over the years. Enjoy!

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Karma

A working plan... (download FLAC zip file HERE) 

Peace and happiness for every man... (stream or download 320 MP3 HERE)

23 Skidoo x Pharoah Sanders

But one demand... (download FLAC zip file HERE) 

Happiness thorough all the land... (stream or download 320 MP3 HERE)