John Coltrane (1926-1967) needs little introduction, a revolutionary figure of the avant-garde jazz scene and a damn good saxophonist. The man has been heralded far and wide but the titles of two of his records, Cosmic Music and Interstellar Space, suggest he already had his head above the clouds.
In the 1950s, John Coltrane fell in step with the inner city heroin epidemic plaguing the U.S. Legend has it that Coltrane locked himself away in a little room in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and fed himself on bread and water so he could kick the damn habit. The world kept turning and Coltrane wanted to keep changing with it because in his words, “you’ve got to look back at the old things and see them in a new light.”
Hello, America.
This fall, Americans were occupying space the way Coltrane infuses a note with vision. Californian security guards pepper non-violent student protesters; American politicians swung from bemusement to outrage; a tremendous sense of loss was our crescendo and the din was deafening but people were still tenting. A new frontier in American politics was being imagined and we got to pick the beats. No room for a soloist in this occupation—it required a multitude—an expansive, breathing, space.
The otherworldly imaginations spilling out of Zucotti park deserve a soundtrack like Alice and John Coltrane’s Cosmic Music, released posthumously in 1968 by Impulse! Records. The album is one of John’s most unconventional, played in free meter and with almost no harmonic structure, like a body without a skeleton.
John only plays on two tracks, “Manifestation” and “Reverend King,” and still, somehow, manages to shake up the whole album. “Reverend King” writhes around until you don’t know where you were when you first showed up; this music goes straight to the head, tosses you around, and tricks you into wanting a little bit more. The track documents the kinked-out noise of Mr. Coltrane, slam-dunking the bass clarinet he inherited from Eric Dolphy; the superb, yet short-lived multi-instrumentalist at the center of New York’s jazz and art scene, who masterminded several of the arrangements on Africa/Brass. On Cosmic Music the Coltrane duo seem to be hankering after extraordinary, inter-galactic truths. They want to transport you to another state of consciousness—a different planet—they’re imaging an entirely new sonic frontier.
http://www.dailymotion.com/videox8q17l
John Coltrane – “Reverend King” from Cosmic Music, Impulse! (1968)
Everyday sound is “spacemusic”, a sub-genre called “head music” in the ‘60s and ‘70s that incites creative participation through visual interpretation. Full of bings and bangs, echoes and repeats, “spacemusic” is meant to transport you from one planet to another, it’s designed to incite introspective levels of consciousness. Poet Sonia Sanchez writes about John Coltrane the way Occupy Wallstreet toys with turning sound into music:
my favorite thins/is u/blowen/yo/favorite/things
stretchen the mind/till it bursts past the con/fines of
solo/en melodies/ to the many/solos/ of the
mind/spirit.
The Coltrane couple defy musical predictability by creating music that hopes to frighten you into a little introspection; they want you to get down with a little bit of un-defined spiritual shit. The same can be said for Occupy Wallstreet but somewhere along the way it became more about tents and less about the wealthiest 1%. The movement may have echoed a familiar populist refrain but if the song has no beginning or end there are no limits. How do we transform sound into music or an occupation into progress?
Don’t play Interstellar Space (1974) if you’re looking for an easy answer. Coltrane blasts through the roof on tenor sax and is accompanied by Rashied Ali who teases listeners with a shifting pattern on drums. The album is all about improvised jazz—dense and sometimes difficult to access—the sound of ceremonial wind-chime bells only add to the manic vibe of the LP.
John Coltrane – “Leo”, from Interstellar Space, Impulse! (1974)
Listening to “Leo” is like riding the subway drunk on a Saturday night from Manhattan to Brooklyn. The horn screams for attention with a pitch on par with the screaming laughter of drunk women or the mumbled begging of a bum who likes to sit outside my train stop and yell: “Any spare change, hunny?” I stopped seeing him on my corner once the occupation began. This fall he was given warm shelter and free food at Zucotti Park. The irony is sickening—better to get dizzy trying to follow Rashied’s rhythmic whirring then watch a man be fed by everyone except the Feds.
I last saw him a couple of weeks ago. He had an angry scratch down his left cheekbone, which he tells me he received from NYPD, during the second and now successful effort to clear the park. I give him the rest of my laundry money. Not because it was the nice thing to do but because it was the right thing to do. As I turned with hunched shoulders he asked, “So, are we livin’ on Mars or is this still Planet Earth?”
Slothrust
Januar 31, 2012
This is an awesome write-up! It really touches on a lot of different important aspects of the jazz world as well as current politics.
Ian Mansur
Januar 31, 2012
How does one understand anything? Is understanding an innate response governed only by heredity, intelligence, and/or unforeseen ‘genius luck’ as in the cases of Einstein and Coltrane? Perhaps. Although, I think a more intimate and appropriate answer may be that we are left to merely draw conclusions based solely upon a learned method of reasoning, an environmental framework slightly unique to each of us is all that serves to attempt to piece together the puzzling setting to which we all appear in as life forms of the smallest degree. This reasoning, integral to us all for survival, can lead to a misrepresentation of what is truth. That, BECAUSE someone can proclaim that, “the sky is falling” or “the earth is flat” we are to assume the understanding of how the sky CAN fall or how the universe WILL flatten the earth is complete and true, and therefore can perpetuate misnomers in the passing of and evolution of knowledge!
What stands above this?
Some of our understanding of the world is truly factual (i.e. mammals need oxygen to survive, some apples are red, etc…) or static. This leaves little to debate. However, maybe one of the most important techniques to another kind of understanding is through the direct or artfully designed correlation to the many microcosms that point to the summation of our collective human psyche – our relativism to everything in the world that acts as a catalyst or medium for our displays of humanity or inhumanity.
John Coltrane as an artist and person, who fits as much into the mold as the rest of us, stands alone when he adheres to the remarkably silent and cacophonous beauty of the non-static dimension of sound. Awarding the world with the written music and other tangibles that “defy musical predictability,” the listener is allowed to access a misunderstood realm of thought, emotion and fear.
Scared must have been the peaceful protesters, who as a collective wanted the best for everyone, including the enemy. With uncertainty fueling the unknown, these people KNEW that the only way to breakdown a cold and unchecked reality, is to submit fully to the notion of blindness – a sacrifice for the true glimpse of needed change and thoughtfulness.
I feel as though when it comes to my MISunderstanding of the lofty brilliance of Coltrane and the maddeningly destructive tendencies of authority, I am not unique. Nonetheless, when I read this article, I felt as though I knew the author – as if she was lovingly nudging me to remember that in this world of violence and misunderstanding, the beauty and interconnection of human plight and art is an analogy for our need to love and destroy one another.
T.Bitchredge
Februar 2, 2012
Wow, what a great article! One of the most widely echoed refrains about the Occupy movement is that its fluidity and lack of structure render it powerless to achieve actual change within the rigid boundaries of the American political system. Yet I think the author is right when she notes that while the individual cries of the Occupy protestors may seem like a cacophony of discordant notes, taken together they create a fierce and unquenchable sound, capable of altering our perceptions and lifting our spirits, reminiscent of Coltrane’s greatest works.
John Shlaglefitz
Februar 3, 2012
Awesomeee
Martha
Februar 3, 2012
Awesome writing about an awesome musician, an awesome town, and an awesome time in history.
Haveed Jubkadha
Februar 5, 2012
Bad ass
Penguino
Februar 8, 2012
Great article! In highlighting current events and their relationship to Coltrane’s work you’ve captivated the reader. Your exploration into the possible connections between political consciousness in New York and Coltrane’s ‘out of this world’ music begs the reader to dive head first and experience the cosmic introspection for themselves. Amazing!