Jazz is a difficult realm for completionists—especially when you’re dealing with cats like Miles Davis. Jazz players were notorious for recording everything, and almost all of those records have something notable to justify collecting it. But there’s so much to sort through.

While my own jazz collecting has mostly focused on Davis’ electric period and the work his band members (e.g., Herbie Hancock, John McLaughlin, Chick Corea…) were doing, there’s one important piece that had escaped my collecting until recently.

That is Jack Johnson, a celebration of Black Excellence originally commissioned as a soundtrack for a documentary about the titular champion boxer, who famously shrugged off threats from the KKK to lay down to white opponents.

But perhaps my own interest in it is that this is the only time that Davis collaborated with Sonny Sharrock, my favorite jazz guitarist—even of Sonny was uncredited.

Davis’ Electric period is a wild ride, ranging between the sublime ambience of In a Silent Way to the tantric chaos of Bitches Brew to the heroin-laced funk of On the Corner.

But while Jack Johnson might still have the side-long compositions and liberal tape editing of producer Teo Macero, it’s likely the most accessible of his fusion records. It’s largely absent of the freeform nebulousness of Bitches Brew or the no-holds-barred monstrosity of Live Evil. At the same time, it’s far more muscular than In a Silent Way, which sometimes achieves full weightlessness.

It’s full fledged rock at times, dual drummers pushing straight ahead grooves with McLaughlin’s guitar taking much of the lead. There are some quieter, nocturnal passages, but they demand far less patience than the formless moments of Live Evil.

Granted, it’s gonna take me some time to get as familiar with this one as the others (I’m still mostly a stranger to On the Corner), but it’s far less daunting than the rest of the period.