Originally released February 1962
Reissued January 14, 2022
Impulse
1xLP
Compiled from sets recorded during his legendary residency at The Village Vanguard, “Live” at the Village Vanguard is now universally hailed as an undeniable jazz classic, but like much of his later work was an object of scorn and praise in equal measure when it was first released. Called “anti-jazz” and “musical nonsense” by critics whose monocles presumably broke while watching Coltrane play. The two sides of the album include some of Coltrane’s most famous and controversial collaborators with Side one centrepiece “Spiritual” including Eric Dolphy on clarinet, one of the few other figures in jazz from that era that could legitimately claim to be as ahead of their time as Coltrane. Side two is made up entirely of the 16 minute epic “Chasin’ the Trane” with the same quartet that would go on to play on A Love Supreme two years later and cement themselves and Coltrane as giants of the genre. Not bad for musical nonsense.