Sun Ra is often cited for a highly improvised style characterized by atonality and aleatoric performances made by treated instruments, resulting in previously unheard timbres and sometimes clashing juxtapositions. Not all of his large body of recordings really sound that extreme, but this one does. In the early 1970s, Sun Ra had a distribution deal with Impulse! Records, which released or reissued ten albums before the agreement was abruptly terminated. Pathways to Unknown Worlds actually achieved release (at least, three of its four tracks did), but Friendly Love was one of several recordings returned to Sun Ra and shelved. This CD combines both albums. Annotator Robert L. Campbell notes that Pathways to Unknown Worlds “is all guided improvisation,” made up on the spot by the musicians under Sun Ra’s direction; the same is true of Friendly Love. Though the improvisations are cued, they are for the most part formless, and range from raucous passages of overblowing squawks by the horns to quieter passages carried on repetition and variation. On the title track of the first album and on “Friendly Love III,” Akh Tal Ebah plays “space dimension mellophone,” a mellophone played with a contrabassoon reed, and also on “Friendly Love III,” Danny Ray Thompson plays “Neptunian libflecto,” which Campbell describes as “a bassoon that has suffered a hostile takeover.” Much of Pathways to Unknown Worlds suggests the kind of music Miles Davis was playing around the same time, although except for his own keyboard instruments, Sun Ra eschews electric instruments. It’s challenging listening, but the calmer Friendly Love, which follows, is more accessible. Nevertheless, this is Sun Ra at his most experimental. – William Ruhlmann
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