Getting into this crazy genre and loving some here & there, but a lot of it is pretty impenetrable to me. I can't get into the really out-there shit like Cecil Taylor, it's just beyond me, too cerebral and detached.

Artists I'm really digging: Art Ensemble of Chicago, Eric Dolphy, some '60s Impulse and ESP Disk stuff on the free jazz tip (esp. Albert Ayler, early Pharoah Sanders), Sun Ra's more accessible albums, pretty much anything Charlie Haden played on. I'm generally more into late '50s/early '60s jazz overall, and I hate the later fusion type stuff except some Yusef Lateef.

Any recommendations? I'm generally looking for more emotive, "lyrical" playing. And are there any other groups/artists similar to Art Ensemble of Chicago (i.e. more light-hearted and immersive, with all the weird little noises and bells and so on)?

Coltrane's A Love Supreme ft motherfucking w...it's not bells and whistles or whatever you said you liked, but THAT is one hell of an album. It's about as quintessential as you can get in a genre such as Free Jazz.

Isn't it musicians who have gotten to the point where they can play jazz SO WELL they just make impossible shit that doesn't even sound good... but at the same time it transcends the skill of the entire population?

I'm already very familiar with Coltrane, but yeah, great record.

Haha, yeah, well, some of the stuff is like that. I'm not into it for the technical skill so much though, but more the raw intensity that you get from dudes like Albert Ayler, for example -- he just goes all out, totally unconstrained by any jazz conventions whatsoever. His playing is more violent and insane than Cannibal Holocaust.

This shit makes a lot more sense if you listen to it while high.

Well there is the stuff miles did with his second great quintet. But the free jazz album to get is Ornette Coleman's "Something Else!!!!." You really can't go wrong with any Ornette Coleman, when i think of free jazz i think of him. Another great pianist in addition to cecil taylor is lennie tristano. He was probably the first free jazz player with recordings dating back to the late forties.

but don't take my word for it, check it out

I'm not really familiar with jazz at all, but I'll recommend The Bad Plus. It's the only jazz I listen to but I really like them.

Thanks, I'll check out Lennie Tristano. Heard the name before but never picked up any of his stuff. I've heard a lot of Ornette Coleman's Atlantic recordings, didn't know if any later stuff was worthwhile but I'll give it a listen.

This is not free jazz. WTF is this cover of "Iron Man", why are they doing this?

Because it's an easy way to break the conceived pretension of the jazz idiom? Or, in layman, because people like "Iron Man" and they probably like "Iron Man", too, so why not play a song they like and their audience likes in a way that they want to play it? Sometimes, people do stuff because it is fun.

http://www.importantrecords.com/rele...lease_page.htm

dude, coltrane's Interstellar space