For many, “compromise” is the dirtiest word in art. It suggests artists sell out, catering to buyers’ whims, sullying themselves and their “self-expression” for filthy lucre. We like to believe our favorite artists are fierce individualists, standing up to the Man for their personal visions, but cult artists like Texas psychedelic innovator Roky Erickson and dub genius Lee “Scratch” Perry reveal how conventional the mainstream really is. Erickson, Perry, and jazz composer Sun Ra make music one giant step outside that mainstream, music so private that average listeners are left puzzling, to paraphrase Dr. Suess, until their puzzlers are sore.

A battalion of questions are suggested by music that makes no concessions, and speculation surrounds the artists that make it. For instance, is Erickson really acid-damaged, or are his songs about B-movie monsters elaborate put-ons? Yale professor John F. Szwed addresses the debate that surrounds Sun Ra in Space is the Place: The Lives and Times of Sun Ra. The book is more than a biography of Sun Ra (known throughout the book as “Sonny”); it examines his music and the ideas that shaped it, and while Szwed doesn’t explain away all of Sun Ra’s eccentricities, he does give the reader a much clearer sense of the roots of the man and his music.

Sun Ra is best known for space-themed lyrics and hard jazz that explores the outermost fringes of melody and rhythm, and not surprisingly, such compositions aren’t for everyone. He called himself a “tone scientist,” and anyone who has seen Michael Ray and the Cosmic Krewe has seen the effect music by tone scientists can have. At one Tipitina’s show, Ray, a former member of Sun Ra’s Arkestra, began one of Sun Ra’s “Discipline” compositions. The seemingly atonal blast of sound that followed split the crowd. Many flew to the door as if chased by the fireball in the tunnel in Independence Day; others, however, stood slackjawed, mesmerized by the complexity, the originality and the audacity of the piece. As Szwed documents, this sort of response was common in Sun Ra’s career, but Sonny never wavered in his musical vision. When a British critic claimed that his five year-old daughter could play the caterwauling he heard, Sun Ra replied, “She could play it, but could she write it?”

This improbable, uncommercial music was Sonny’s obsession, and he demanded dedication from his musicians. He assumed the role of teacher as well as bandleader, and taught discipline to members of the Arkestra, sometimes, according to Szwed, teaching it physically. Such teaching worked; Arkestra member James Jascon recalls in the book complaining about new members who were “drinking too much, using drugs and going after women—not realizing that we had all been like that before we managed to discipline ourselves.” This discipline was necessary because Sonny made remarkable demands on his musicians. He organized an octet in 1954, and according to Szwed, he “told the musicians this band would not make money, [and] they might have to rehearse five, maybe ten years before they would be ready to play in public.” While the octet didn’t wait anywhere near that long before performing, Sonny was serious about rehearsing, sometimes practicing ten or more hours during the day before playing a gig that night.

He was also serious about not making any money. His musical ambitions frequently outstripped his business sense. In the fall of 1971, Sun Ra started his second European tour with twenty-two musicians, six dancers and two singers. Predictably, touring with such a large band was economically disastrous, and before the tour was half-over, the entourage was half that size. Most quit, but Sonny himself fired three who broke into his hotel room and tried to force him to pay them. Members of the Arkestra frequently needed other gigs to pay their bills because Sun Ra earned so little. When they were paid the pittance they earned from Sonny, it was yet another eccentric experience. According to Szwed, “Sonny administered their individual pay by a logic which was not always apparent—by how well they were playing, how many rehearsals they attended, how long they had been playing with him, how well they obeyed his instructions.”

The musicians more than earned their money because, as James Jacson pointed out, “At the beginning of each rehearsal…Sonny talked about [his cosmic philosophies], sometimes for many hours.” Szwed explains Sun Ra’s philosophies in Space is the Place, but perhaps the book’s greater contribution is Szwed’s exploration of the Afro-centric origins of Sonny’s beliefs. Living alone in Chicago in 1949, Sonny made the decision to become a scholar of black culture, the Bible, Egyptology, and numerology. He came to believe “that the Bible must be demythologized, decoded and brought in tune with modern life; that it was possible to unify all knowledge; that the universe was organized hierarchically; with forces or spirits that moved between the levels and affected life on earth.”

The sheets of sound many found intimidating Sun Ra thought of as expressions of pure spirit, and he valued spirit above all else. “The key to understanding,” Szwed writes, “is…by allowing your spirit to guide and control your actions. The spirit is part of the Creator.” For that reason, Sun Ra felt that all his music was an extension of the Creator, and he told his musicians that “there are no mistakes.” According to trumpeter Lucious Randolph, “Sonny gave you a form, but freedom to do what you wanted to do with that form. He didn’t want his music to be perfect.”

Playing for Sun Ra sounds like a trial, but Szwed suggests that his charisma and metaphysical nature attracted players. That must have been true, but unfortunately, Sonny never seems charismatic in Space is the Place; in fact, the reader is not left with a very clear picture of what he was like to be around, which is unusual for a biography. Sonny’s poetry—such as it is—is reprinted here, and Szwed quotes him extensively, but his words and writings seem formal and humorless. The Sun Ra Swzed presents had a one-track mind that focused on his music as a way of communicating his idiosyncratic astro-philosophy, so he is not always an appealing character. He may have in fact been as dour as he seems, but it is disappointing that Szwed doesn’t account for Sonny’s personal appeal more fully.

Space is the Place is clearly intended to make Sun Ra’s beliefs plausible, but Sonny’s system is so personal that it remains almost impenetrable. However, Szwed’s exposure of its sources makes the book important because Sun Ra was not the only man to have fashioned unconventional beliefs from these sources. Sonny distanced himself from the Nation of Islam, but today Louis Farrakhan’s speeches feature the sort of deconstructing wordplay Sun Ra indulged in, and the Million Man March called for the kind of personal discipline that Sonny taught his musicians. Lee “Scratch” Perry and Culture’s Joseph Hill share Sonny’s futuristic spirituality; Perry’s lyrics focused on UFOs and demons, and on Two Sevens Clash, one of the great reggae albums, Hill sings of “the black starliner which is to come. “

After 400 pages of Space is the Place, readers will find Sun Ra almost as cryptic a figure as they found him before they started. The source of his unshakable belief in his music remains a mystery, as does the reason for his dedication to such a financially punishing way of life. Because he synthesized disparate spiritual and cultural tracts into an unconventional religious belief, his lyrics are only marginally clearer, but Szwed’s exploration reveals that the beliefs have roots. This suggests that cult artists are not freaks or—ahem—aliens, but people who process day-to-day life a little bit differently. In New Orleans, that’s handy to remember.

One quick note: the Funky Butt will hold a Jazz Poetry Cutting Contest on Nov. 9. The night will feature John Sinclair vs. Kalamu ya Salaam. Call the Funky Butt at 558-0872 for more information.