Still reeling from the aftershock of getting to do a Low Culture podcast on vintage Doctor Who, John was dealt a TKO by Luke this month when he agreed to have a conversation about a jazz album! But schtum that hanging gatemouth daddio, as when the pair discuss Alice Coltrane’s phenomenal 1971 album for Impulse! – Journey In Satchidananda – they realise that nothing is quite what it seems. Whether this inimitable cultural artefact of late 20th century spirituality should even be strictly thought of as jazz is just one problem facing the Quietus editors. The pair talk about the incredible privations of mortification the artist put herself through – tests that caused her physical harm as well as humiliation – and yet, how it left her with an incredibly deep facility for hearing the minutest details in sound; and how she also gained the ability to hear heavenly music in all noise, whether the humming of a fridge, the roar of a distant plane or the snoring of her children. John and Luke also talk about what fans of spiritual music in the 21st century could gain from the close study of this record and how to approach the very complex issue of Alice Coltrane’s incredible talent as something apart from the influence of her late husband, John.
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