JOHN COLTRANE Meditations (Verve Vault Series 2026 limited edition 5-track LP pressed on 180-gram Black Vinyl. Recorded on 23 November 1965 at Rudy Van Gelder's Englewood Cliffs studio, Meditations is the last studio recording tofeature John Coltrane's celebrated Classic Quartet, McCoy Tyner, Jimmy Garrison and Elvin Jones, before Tyner departed within weeks and Jones followed by early 1966. For the session, Coltrane doubled down rather than held back,expanding the group into a sextet by adding Pharoah Sanders on tenor and a second drummer, Rashied Ali, a decision that pushed the music into far denser, more turbulent territory and, by Tyner's own account, buried much of what the pianist and Jones were playing beneath the wall of sound. Tyner later explained his departure plainly: he couldn't hear his own contribution in the music any longer, and when he had no feeling for it, he didn't play. What survives on tape is the sound of a legendary band dissolving in real time, right at the edge of its own transformation, a suite-like meditation on transcendence that closes with a brief, quieter passage returning Garrison and the old quartet's chemistry one last time. This edition is part of the Verve Vault series, entirely analogue and cut from the original master tapes by Ryan K. Smith at Sterling Sound, pressed on 180-gram vinyl, presented in a gatefold picture sleeve with hype sticker, and factory sealed).