Wow, I thought I'd had my share of difficult listening at the back end of last month, but the challenging records keep on coming. Ascension was the second Coltrane record I bought in 1985, after A Love Supreme — and it put me off buying a third one for several years. This is one of the records that Philip Larkin notoriously loathed, writing in his review that, "Soloists appear and submerge like Titanic passengers" and vilifying "that latter day religiosity, exemplified in turgid suites such as A Love Supreme and Ascension that set up pretension as a way of life; that wilful, hideous distortion of tone that offered squeals, squeaks, Bronx cheers and throttled slate-pencil noises for serious consideration."
Well, I was guided by the Jazz Masters of the 50s
that also led me to Mingus, and particularly attracted to Coltrane because I've always liked over spirituality in music, from Jon Anderson to John Tavener. But I could see what Larkin meant (apart from the smug jibe about pretension). As with yesterday's record, I'm more resilient and better able to find pleasure in the apparent mess these days.
The album cover is gorgeous. I was fortunate to get the UK re-issue on Jasmine which has less extraneous text and label logos than any of the other releases. It's so lovely that I'm tempted to get one of those album cover frames
and hang it on my wall. Displaying Coltrane albums is such a middle-class-white-guy-coffee-table thing to do, but I might do it anyway.
MusicBrainz entry for this album
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