If you can get down with this style of accessible spiritual jazz, then picking up Lonnie Liston Smith's first four albums is a no-brainer. Of the first four, Astral Traveling is the most indebted to Pharoah Sanders' style. Compared to subsequent releases, the material here is oriented more toward hypnosis than groove, and there are no vocals. Saxophonist George Barron is derivative of Sanders and Coltrane but plays very well, and the band includes Mtume on percussion as well as the great bassist Cecil McBee. Smith succeeds about as well as Pharoah Sanders or Alice Coltrane did in this period at establishing a satisfying "spiritual" atmosphere which is deeply relaxing and pleasing to behold, and that's saying a lot.