Ascension
Spiritual Unity
Bitches Brew
For Alto
for me.

surprised you dig Ascension and especially Spiritual Unity Jamie.

Also agreed Coltrane must have wanted to basically record his own version of Free Jazz with Ascension but what he ended up with is simply beyond anything even Coleman could have imagined.

I often favour the more adventurous and challenging side of jazz but only when done right and in a way that feels natural.

Album Rating: 2.0

Agreed w altertide, free jazz is obviously ridiculously important but is nothing to ascension.

A Love Supreme
This
In A Silent Way
Machine Gun
One Too Many Salty Swift And Not Goodbye

This
Ascension
Machine Gun
I don't even know 4th fav :/

Album Rating: 4.5

Ummmmmm.....



This

Unit Structures

Out to Lunch

Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus

Machine Gun



Yeah that'll do

Album Rating: 5.0

Jac your av gives huge Snide vibes

Album Rating: 3.0

somehow it does

Album Rating: 5.0

Never heard of Machine Gun b4 today

Mingus Mingus... isn't one of his best albums imo. It recycles some old songs.

Album Rating: 5.0

I need to check out the other Mingus albums so bad but I'm lazy af so all I can do now is feel left out in this thread):

Machine Gun is a masterpiece and huuuuuuuugely influential in noise and harsher forms of free jazz, not for everyone however but give it a listen if only for historical value

Album Rating: 3.0

yea, for example, i think it's complete bullshit

Album Rating: 5.0

I'll probably hate it too, but historical value will entice me every time haha

Album Rating: 5.0

idk I happen to dig weird-ass experimental jazz, might be because I love brass instruments but I don't think it'll be too much of a problem digging Machine Gun

yeah Machine Gun is actually quite easy, there are even times when it devotes itself to melody (my favourite being the ending of "Responsible" - can't beat that)

Album Rating: 5.0

altertide0, "The Sinner Lady" beats every free jazz album you mention, the sheer genius of the multi-instrument compositions are yet to surpass in Jazz. The only artist to fusion classical music roots with jazz, like a symphony, big band, musical cohesion, etc.



This is clearly the 1º, here I agree with Scaruffi, and second for me Kind of Blue. Then comes the rest, probably a Love Supreme, Out To Lunch, Ah Um, Shape of Jazz to come, Silent Way, har to order those.

Album Rating: 5.0

dawg check Ascension

Yeah so I agree that The Black Saint... may be the best of the *composed* jazz records (although I haven't heard many), but why should composition be better than spontaneous improvisation? The pure, raw stream-of-conciousness trio of Spiritual Unity strikes me as much more emotional than the multi-layered but somewhat rigid composition of Mingus. I don't think the amount of instruments makes The Black Saint... better than, say, For Alto (whose only instrument is used much more "intelectually" than any of Mingus's), but if it did, well, Ascension is just as textured.

I think many people that dig The Black Saint... are either traditionalists or classicists who are glad to have found something familiar yet so sophisticated in the world of jazz. I don't think that's what jazz should be about (we have classical for that after all), but I was never a fan of (non-modern) classical anyway, the harmonies, however complex (I like complex) could never touch me as much as dissonance, they're too perfect, too "super-human" to move me.

It's all a matter of preference of course, and I love The Black Saint... myself. Just not as much as the best of free-jazz (and beyond, as I don't think the term applies to Anthony Braxton for example).

Album Rating: 5.0

The big reason I dig this album is that it's the first jazz album that truly feels like an orchestral piece. I could actually imagine going downtown to one of those fancy concert halls to hear this piece.



But with that said, even with me digging this and free jazz like Ascension, I always just go back to bebop/hard bop as my favorite types of jazz. They're the kind of music that got me into the genre to begin with.

Free Jazz and Spiritual Jazz and some such are more interesting and generally more memorable but -Bop are the most entertaining and the ones I listen to the most simply because they're always listenable, which isn't really something I can say about those other kinds (I listen to Art Blakey's Moanin' [song] or Coltrane's Cousin Mary more than any avant-jazz composition including Coltrane's own brand, even though A Love Supreme is my favorite jazz record)

What I like about this is that this is a big compromise but it has no sacrifices, no good aspect of one is removed for the sake of the other, and both the avant-garde and the -bop aspect of it have their own flavor unique to Mingus which is really quite an achievement.

Even with that being said though, I don't listen to it too much since I believe this needs to be listened to from start to finish and I can't just put it on and chill with it because it's very intrusive due to how many things are happening, so the desire to just sit down and focus on it has to be there for me to really enjoy it.