Space Probe

A transition classic. Recorded mostly in the early '60s with Ra, Marshall Allen, John Gilmore, James Jacson, Nimrod Hunt and Thea Barbara, Space Probe explores stripped back forms and colour combinations that are far from jazz -- or that attempt, very successfully, to take jazz into wholly new territories. Especially notable is the extraordinary Conversation Of J.P. for piano and percussion which, along with the opening track - an 18-minute Moog solo, probably recorded in 1970, just after Ra had newly acquired the instrument and was still putting it through its paces - make this an essential release in the Ra canon. As a whole, there is an impressive palette of ideas and experiments here, situating Ra at the heart of the musical revolution that was overturning orthodoxies in every field of musical endeavor at this time. The title track is notable as documenting Ra's early exploration (his first released) of the unworldly potential of a newly-acquired Mini-Moog --a prototype, in fact, given him by Robert Moog to test. Moog always claimed afterwards that he never understood exactly where some of those sounds came from -- suspecting he might have modified the instrument in some way.