Continuation, Vol. 1

Album review

Continuation is an interesting late-'60s date with a nice mixture of styles. "Biosphere Blues" is a great slow blues with room for a number of solos, but anchored by the phenomenal playing of Ronnie Boykins. "Intergalaxtic Research" has some creepy space voice over a plodding beat which is joined by creepy organ, and "New Primitive Earth" is a weird flute/bells/koto experiment. "New Planet" is very cool space-exotica with Bugs Hunter (presumably) adding enormous washes of reverb and echo at various points in the tune. "Continuation To" starts with a crazed circus fanfare and then features Sun Ra on speed piano before calming down for a trumpet solo over an eight-beat bass ostinato. "Jupiter Festival" is a cacophonous romp with the saxophones' swooping squeals matched by Boykins' squealing arco. Continuation features several interesting instruments, like the Jupiterian Flute and Neptunian Libflecto and the space voice of Art Jenkins, and is one of several albums that demonstrate what a great player Ronnie Boykins was.
© Sean Westergaard /TiVo