Strata-East Records

 Strata-East was founded in 1971 by trumpeter Charles Tolliver and pianist Stanley Cowell.

Inspired by the Detroit label Strata, Tolliver and Cowell's vision was for a musician-controlled label. Musicians would fund and produce their recordings, bring the master to Strata-East for production, promotion and distribution, with a higher share of the money going to the musicians.

The label had a surprise hit with Gil Scott-Heron and Brian Jackson's Winter in America, which helped fund some further releases and pay off debts. The label continued into the 1980s began losing steam. Nonetheless, the music was influential.

Here are a couple real standouts in their catalog:

Alkebu-Lan, The Land of the Blacks

The double album’s was recorded at The East, an important venue best-remembered for Pharaoh Sanders' Live at the East. Interesting side note, The East was a blacks-only club, even prominent white musicians were turned away. The Mtume Umoja Ensemble was lead by percussionist Mtume, who at the time was just beginning a long stint with Miles Davis electro-funk enesemble and features saxophonists Gary Bartz and Carlos Garnett (both were in Miles Davis’s band) and the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians’ Leroy Jenkins on violin. But this album is much further out than even the Miles band, and that's saying something. It's a masterpiece of Black Nationalist spiritual improvisation.

Izipho Zam

Pharaoh Sanders recorded this gem in 1969, but for some reason it was not released until Strata-East put it out in 1973. The album features an epic cast of 15 musicians, including drummer Billy Hart, guitarist Sonny Sharrock and bassist Cecil McBee. They large cast of musicians really bring the heat and an edginess not found in his later, more spiritual albums.