According to AL.com, New Dawn features seven tracks: “Prologue,” “African Sunset,” “New Dawn,” “Are You Ready,” “Sonny’s Dance,” “Boma” and “Angels and Demons at Play.”

Allen, who has led the Sun Ra Arkestra (named after the brilliant, Afrofuturist jazz musician Sun Ra) since 1995, spoke with Jazzwise last year about how he discovered — and ultimately joined — the Arkestra, sharing how it all began with coming across the group’s Super-Sonic Jazz album released in 1957.

“I had a job at a camera company, polishing lenses. One day, I got off work and bought that album. I took it home and listened to it and I was like, ‘Boy, what’s that band?’ The stuff they were doing, I’d never heard that before. It was far out and [had] different kinds of melodies,” he recalled. “So, I went back and asked the guy I bought the record off, ‘Where’s this band? This is a real band!’ He said, ‘Well, they’re right up there near you, about six blocks from where you live. They practice every night up there.’ So, I went and found ’em. I heard the band, and they sounded so good, I ran back and brought my horn!”

“‘Course, I was late for work the next day,” Allen continued. “I’d stayed up all night with Sun Ra because, after he got through rehearsing, we went over to hear a saxophone player in a club and then we went out to eat and, the next thing you know, it was four or five in the morning, and I went to work all late and sleepy and everything. That was when I met him. And he asked me to come to rehearsals.”

“I tried to get into the band and then I was lucky because some of the mainstay guys were moving to New York. In ‘58, [Sun Ra] finally let me in,” he added.