Heaven

The Arica School, an educational organisation devoted to exploring Bolivian philosopher Oscar Ichazo’s protoanalysis and ‘integral philosophy,’ released three albums of loose, freely improvised music in the early 1970s — Audition, Arica, and Heaven. Out of these, Heaven is the most condensed experience, or at least, as condensed as you’re going to get for such expansive music. In many ways, it’s of a piece with any number of hippie-ish, meandering, quasi-levitational sect sets; the chanting is present, the percussion trickles and meanders, strings quiver in the wind, other instruments burble and chime. But Heaven is seductive as the music’s surprisingly coherent, and open, breathy, free of self-importance; light and airy. It’s a good place to start if you’re interested in the multiple ways that alternative philosophies of thought merge with alternative practices in music.