šŸŽµ I bought the new John Coltrane album on release day, but havenā€™t given it a critical listen until today. This review feels accurate to me:

Whatever reticence a listener might experience with the new album isnā€™t musicological but emotional: the spiritual temperature of the music is lower, its moments of glorious invention have a logical and inviting air that never quite matches the self-exploring, self-transcending volatility of Coltraneā€™s very best recordings, whether made in concert or in the studio. ā€œBoth Directions at Onceā€ is a marker of Coltraneā€™s work at the time rather than the very best of it. Itā€™s as if the band were displaying what it is that they do when they do it, without quite doing it.

It is still, in my opinion, an essential Coltrane album. But itā€™s not his best.

Rian van der Merwe Elezea // The B-Sides