Archie Shepp, another iconic figure of the early years of free-jazz, has established his identity in a more roundabout way than Ornette Coleman. For all his untutored wildness Coleman sounded eerily mature from the late 1950s on. Shepp seemed to make the gestures of musical freedom first, and found his real sound later. Nowadays he mixes a Coltranesque soulfulness and contemporary openness (rapper Chuck D is a guest on the first track, delivering a faintly indulgent Shepp potted history) with an unsteady but affecting romanticism and lurching swing that spans a lot of jazz history.