Archie Shepp and the Full Moon Ensemble, Live in Antibes vol. 1 (side A)

Live in Antibes vol. 1 dates from 1970, and Shepp's records from this era tend to be rather chaotic affairs. He'd moved away from the more recognizable jazz structures of the 60s and had not yet begun working with the pop forms of his early-70s populist albums on Impulse. The group here includes 3 fairly obscure Frenchmen and 3 better-known Americans (Alan Shorter and Clifford Thornton are the other 2). Shepp clearly provides a building structure to the piece, which begins with a long percussion intro, and slowly evolves into more collective and energetic playing. Shepp is on piano through the build, and is clearly not the featured soloist as the ensemble falls into its groove. The cover photo is nice, and the design follows the standard white Actuel format. The vinyl reissues from the series (like my copy of this one) tend to sound better than the originals.