Rudolph Johnson The Second Coming (CD)

(Real Gone) 5 tracks

The title of this album is apt, as it is saxophonist Rudolph Johnson's second album for the Black Jazz label (and this reissue is only the second time this 1973 album has been released on vinyl)! But more importantly, the quality of the music it contains makes the more general, messianic meaning of the phrase "the second coming" equally applicable. Saxophonist and bandleader Rudolph Johnson never had the commercial success of some of his contemporaries, but his fans consider him the rightful heir to the improvisational genius of John Coltrane. And with keyboardist Kirk Lightsey in the band (we've already reissued Johnson's excellent 1971 black jazz album Spring Rain), sparks will fly, starting with the delicious album opener "The Traveler," which, if you close your eyes, will definitely remind you of Coltrane's classic quartet from the early '60s.

Unlike most of the Black Jazz label's other releases, The Second Coming is hardly reminiscent of the fusion and soul jazz trends that dominated jazz at the time. Instead, this is expressive free improvisation at its finest, beautifully recorded by producer Gene Russell, and deserving of a much larger audience than it found the first time around. Remastered and annotated, and, as mentioned, reissued on vinyl for the first time!