Kronos Quartet Enlist Laurie Anderson, Armand Hammer, Jlin, and More for New Sun Ra Tribute Album

Kronos Quartet, photo by Lenny Gonzalez

AIDS-awareness nonprofit Red Hot has announced another new tribute album honoring Sun Ra. Outer Spaceways Incorporated - Kronos Quartet & Friends Meet Sun Ra, out June 21, is the fourth volume in the label’s Red Hot & Ra series. Listen to two songs from it, a reimagining of Sun Ra’s “Daddy’s Gonna Tell You No Lie,” featuring Laraaji, and “Outer Spaceways Incorporated,” with vocals by Georgia Anne Muldrow, below.

“I love the idea of the title ‘Outer Spaceways Incorporated’ because it speaks to the interdependent existence of heaven being braided within us if we accept the charge to be employed by the Most High Boss of All Creation,” Muldrow said in a statement. “Kronos Quartet does a wonderful job of navigating whimsy and otherworldliness with their instrumentation and arrangement and I am honored to be a part of it.”

Kronos Quartet work with a wide-ranging group of collaborators on Outer Spaceways Incorporated - Kronos Quartet & Friends Meet Sun Ra, including Laurie Anderson, Terry Riley, Marshall Allen, Armand Hammer, Jlin, 700 Bliss, RP Boo, and Evicshen, among others. It follows the previous Red Hot + Ra installments Nuclear War, Solar, and The Magic City.

Revisit Pitchfork’s “Sun Ra: 10 Essential Tracks.”

Outer Spaceways Incorporated - Kronos Quartet & Friends Meet Sun Ra:

01 Kronos Quartet / Georgia Anne Muldrow / Jacob Garchik: “Outer Spaceways Incorporated”
02 Jlin / Kronos Quaret: “Maji”
03 Laraaji / Kronos Quartet: “Daddy’s Gonna Tell You No Lie”
04 Steven Bernstein / Sex Mob / Laurie Anderson / Marshall Allen / Kronos Quartet: “Images”
05 Nicole Lizée / Kronos Quartet: “The Furthest Out Things”
06 Laurie Anderson / Marshall Allen: “Phenomenon”
07 Zachary James Watkins / Kronos Quartet: “Black Body Radiance”
08 RP Boo / Armand Hammer: “Blood Running High”
09 Laurie Anderson / Marshall Allen: “The Wuz”
10 700 Bliss: “Secrets of the Sun”
11 Trey Spruance / Secret Chiefs 3 / Kronos Quartet: “Love in Outerspace”
12 Evicshen: “Three Seasons in the Tempestuous Twelve Inch Planet”
13 Terry Riley / Sara Miyamoto / Kronos Quartet: “Kiss Yo’ Ass Goodbye”

Originally Appeared on Pitchfork