The New Jersey-raised Joey DeFrancesco's hard-swinging small-group albums have delivered fluency, grit and romance for decades. His bass pedals alone could power a big band and he joyously combines a stylistic range spanning Jimmy Smith's modernism to the modal approach of Larry Young. This album stands in that uplifting tradition, but adds the extra interest of featuring saxophonist Pharoah Sanders on three tracks and a repertoire drenched in the vibes of spiritual jazz. The opener, ‘Inner Being’, begins with a rattle of gourds; ‘Vibrations in Blue’ starts with modal trades and Indian inflections. Troy Roberts slurs and wails on soprano sax on the former, plays fruity boppish alto on the latter and DeFrancesco, powered by the imperious drumming of Billy Hart, builds up a head of steam on both. Roberts plays tenor on the rest of his featured tracks, switching effortlessly from modal jazz to swing on ‘It Swung Open’ and elsewhere equalling the leader's commanding presence on a mid-tempo floater, a ballad, curiously named ‘A Pathway Through the Noise’ and the twisty bossa ‘Easier to Be’, the album's final track. But it is the tantalising presence of Pharoah Sanders that makes the album stand out. The saxophonist joins five tracks into the set, on the gong-introduced title-track, a mid-tempo minor key blues. DeFrancesco adds further variety by switching to piano for the genre defining ‘The Creator Has a Master Plan’ and adding harmon-muted trumpet and smoky Fender Rhodes for the latin-inflected ‘And So It Is’. Organ jazz was following a modal course when Sanders mellowed into spiritual jazz after first recording with John Coltrane. Here his fast lines, confident phrasing and grainy tone are an instantly recognisable and perfectly natural fit. His presence gives the album a mid-set lift, without overshadowing what follows or came before.