With saxophonist Pharoah Sanders and drummer Rashied Ali added to the long-running John Coltrane quartet (pianist McCoy Tyner and drummer Elvin Jones would leave soon after), the five tracks on Meditations are organized into two side-long suites; the opening “The Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost/Compassion” is an extended improvisatory forest fire that only settles into a groove about 13 minutes in, while “Love/Consequences/Serenity” is its mirror image, a long ballad that erupts briefly in the middle before drifting slowly down to earth.