Sun Ra-Sound Sun Pleasure!! + We Travel The Space Ways LP

SOUND SUN PLEASURE!! + WE TRAVEL THE SPACE WAYS – SUN RA / PAN AM RECORDS

Two essential early Saturn Records albums united on a single 180g vinyl LP

Sound Sun Pleasure!! recorded March 6, 1959 in Chicago — a rare foray into jazz standards by the Arkestra

Limited edition pressing — an ideal entry point and a treasure for the devoted collector alike

Description

Few figures in the history of jazz cast as long and strange a shadow as Sun Ra. Born Herman Poole Blount in Birmingham, Alabama, he reinvented himself as a cosmic philosopher, bandleader, and composer of staggering prolificacy, self-releasing dozens of records on his own El Saturn Records imprint throughout the 1950s and 60s — artefacts that were pressed in tiny quantities, hand-distributed, and are now among the most sought-after documents in avant-garde music. This Pan Am Records LP brings together two of those artefacts: Sound Sun Pleasure!! and We Travel The Space Ways, offering a uniquely revealing portrait of the Arkestra at a pivotal moment in its development.

Sound Sun Pleasure!! stands apart in the Sun Ra discography for its embrace of the jazz standard repertoire — a side of Ra that is too often overshadowed by his more outré cosmic excursions. Recorded on March 6, 1959 during the same Chicago sessions that yielded the celebrated Jazz in Silhouette, it showcases the Arkestra's deep grounding in the bebop and swing tradition, with Ra's piano voicings bringing an unmistakably personal touch to familiar material. We Travel The Space Ways, by contrast, points firmly toward the cosmos: recorded across sessions in Chicago between 1956 and 1960 and originally issued on Saturn in 1966, it captures the Arkestra in full interstellar flight, with the title track becoming one of Ra's most iconic and oft-cited compositions. Together, the two albums map the full breadth of Sun Ra's musical universe — from the earthly to the otherworldly — and their pairing on a single LP makes for one of the most compelling single-disc introductions to his work available.

Label

Pan Am Records

Format

LP, 180g vinyl