Offering: Live at Temple University

Recorded
Released

The music John Coltrane made between the beginning of 1965 and his death in July 1967 is some of the most unremitting jazz ever committed to tape. He might play a single piece for an hour, engaging in screaming duels with fellow tenor saxophonist Pharoah Sanders, leaving his band — usually pianist Alice Coltrane, bassist Jimmy Garrison, and drummer Rashied Ali, plus guests — to offer support that it didn’t even seem he needed. This concert, from November 1966, features an expanded lineup. Garrison had left the group, and the relatively unknown Sonny Johnson is on bass, but the ensemble is augmented by four percussionists, including a Batá drummer, and two young alto saxophonists, who take one solo each. The endless rumble of the drums gives the music a ritualistic, primal quality that’s only strengthened when, during a 21-minute performance of “Leo,” Coltrane takes the horn out of his mouth and begins pounding his chest and roar-singing into the microphone. The quality is a little rough (it’s a mono recording made with a single microphone, so everyone but Coltrane is a blur in the background), but this is an explosive album, well worth hearing if you think you’re up for it.

Phil Freeman

Suggestions
Love and Ghosts cover

Love and Ghosts

Gerald Cleaver, Farmers by Nature, William Parker, Craig Taborn
Live at the East cover

Live at the East

Pharoah Sanders
Nonaah cover

Nonaah

Roscoe Mitchell
The Trance of Seven Colors cover

The Trance of Seven Colors

Maleem Mahmoud Ghania, Pharoah Sanders