There is a spectral elegance woven through Fate In A Pleasant Mood, where Sun Ra balances gravity and weightlessness with a composer’s cunning hand. Cut in mid-1960s Chicago but not released until 1965, these tracks find Ra’s Myth Science Arkestra shifting from the familiar swing of their South Side origins into a sharper constellation of timeless, compact forms. Here, “Space Mates” twinkles with layered horn choreography while “Lights on a Satellite” pulses with an economy that feels part Ellington, part astral premonition. The effect is both intimate and expansive - a dance on the cusp of tradition and the threshold of the unknown, where every motif glows with the promise of new mythologies.
Ra’s orchestrations highlight the Arkestra’s talents: Marshall Allen’s wiry alto sax and John Gilmore’s galaxy-streaked tenor orbit each composition, while Ronnie Boykins’ bass grounds the music with a bluesy, gravitational pull. Trumpeters Phil Cohran and George Hudson contribute brassy detail, transporting the ensemble from percussive ritual to proto-free improvisation with nimble authority. Yet it’s Sun Ra himself - sometimes on shimmering piano, sometimes conjuring percussion and bells - who reminds listeners that all boundaries in this music are meant to be crossed, blurred, or simply evaporated in pursuit of higher unity.
Unlike the volcanic surges of later Arkestra recordings, Fate In A Pleasant Mood achieves cosmic lift-off by deploying restraint and lyric precision. Its arrangements shimmer with tight, melodic discipline even as they suggest hidden portals to outer realms: this is the sound of transition, where the mystery of orbit mingles harmoniously with the sharp jabs of post-bop experimentation. The title track and “Ankhnaton” meld ritual pulse with exquisite melancholy - testimony to Ra’s conviction that improvisation is itself a kind of stellar navigation, and ensemble interplay, a dialogue between cosmic forces. Restored and reissued anew, Fate In A Pleasant Mood offers one of the most approachable yet slyly profound entries in the Sun Ra catalog. It’s music that beckons both the neophyte and the longtime explorer, a small-scale epic where fate glimmers, not in dread, but in the luminous possibility of the ever-expanding now.
