The Malcolm X Memorial: A Tribute In Music - Philip Cohran & The Artistic Heritage Ensemble

One of the best things about the late 60’s and early 70’s was the wealth of bizarre concept albums that never really took off. For every Tommy there was a God Bless Tiny Tim, and, in terms of jazz, for every universally applauded masterpiece (like Pharoah Sanders’s Karma or Alice Coltrane’s Journey in Satchidananda) there was some sort of interesting, odd, and woefully anti-commercial project like The Malcolm X Memorial: A Tribute in Music. Philip Cohran made his name as a trumpeter with Sun Ra’s Arkestra (Sun Ra, of course, being the Egyptian god of bizarre concept albums), so it’s almost surprising that the music on Malcolm X is as coherent as it is. The album consists of four tracks, each representing a different stage of the former Malcolm Little’s life. The first track, “Malcolm Little” is a slow-burning blues with some nifty jazz flute, emulating Malcolm’s coming of age as his family moved throughout the Midwest. It’s groovy mood music, though it’s not particularly incendiary, especially in light of the innovation to be heard later in the album. The next track, “Detroit Red”, is a brassy big-band number, reminiscent of Sun Ra’s early Sound of Joy-era material. “Detroit Red” is ace old-school bop, the perfect evocation of Malcolm’s time as a conk-haired Harlem hustler, and, at ten minutes, it’s easy to get lost in the ballsy groove and forget just what this album’s all about. Oddly, the track titled “Malcolm X” is the shortest on the album, but it’s a slab of valiant soul-jazz that draws on the dignity of the Malcolm X legend itself. The final track, “El Hajj Malik El Shabazz”, is the only track here that sounds like an elegy for the late civil rights leader, and, with its layers of syncopation, it’s the song that most closely spiritually approaches Malcolm’s controversial doctrine. All in all, this is a well-done concept album, even if it is a bit dated and uneven in spots. For what it’s worth, however, I feel it to be a fitting tribute to one of the civil rights era’s greatest Americans.

Always talkin’ brotherhood, white man, you just ain’t no good.