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For a more cohesive picture of what Riley was ultimately aiming for as a musician, Poppy Nogood and the Phantom Band All Night Flight, Volume 1 offers a 40-minute edit of a six-hour improvised performance on saxophone, organ, and time-lag accumulator from 1968. It is expansive, hypnotic, and ungraspable. This recording isn't much different from that found on A Rainbow in Curved Air, but it is longer and louder, factors that really count with Riley. Two additional archive releases are coming soon, the first of which, Music for the Gift, will include Riley's early collaborations with fellow minimalist master LaMonte Young and cool-jazz trumpet player Chet Baker.

-- Alec Hanley Bemis