ra ra ra

I don't really care if this is genuine or not

(Is it, though?)

[via Blue Lines Revisited]

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Met Sun Ra. Interviewed him when he did that not-so-great album for A&M.  Well, more like, was granted an audience with him. Two hours of soft spoken meandering disquisition on the secrets of the Omniverse. During the course of which I uttered barely a word. Somehow it was conveyed that any contribution from me, or attempts to steer the direction, would have been presumptuous and superfluous.

Annoyingly I don't have the tapes (yes, there was a time when I was stupid enough to tape over interview cassettes with new interviews).  Do have a rough transcript -- 3800 words, but only a fraction of the total uttered.

A snippet:

"My job is probably the most neglected factor in the  universe. I knew when I was three years old that I had to do something I didn't want to do, tell people all about this. I didn't even want to play, then. I dedicated my so-called life to the Creator, in that seeing that he's seen and heard everything, I'd play something he'd never heard before.

"Here's something you've never ever experienced before. I have to play for this Creator because other things coming from this planet he's not pleased with - it's like static, pollution in every way...  mental, physical... that's all that goes up there.

    

"That's my advice to musicians - do something that the Creator might sit up and take notice of."