(Review by JC)
I can still remember the
excitement as a teenager of hearing the Mahavishnu Orchestra's album the Inner Mounting Flame for the first
time. Obviously the speed of playing was staggering but so also was the fusion
of jazz and rock and Eastern and Indian influences. And then there were some
really weird, but memorable, time signatures. We knew about John McLaughlin
from his recordings with Miles Davis, particularly Bitches Brew, but this was something else. The album was much
played over the following months.
Even now when some of us from those days meet up, a few MO tracks are usually
played again.
So a number of years ago I was
intrigued when I read an interview with John McLaughlin from the 1980s where he
described moving with his mother from a village in Yorkshire up to
Northumberland to somewhere he says was 'close to the Scottish border'. I have
always wondered where this might have been - maybe his mother ran a B&B in
Seahouses - but never came across any further details. However this new book by
Colin Harper provides the answer - apparently it was 54, Warkworth Avenue , Monkseaton. Some may
argue about whether this qualifies as 'close to the Scottish border' but then
he had travelled all the way up from Doncaster .
As well as writing a good deal of
music journalism over the years, Harper has published a well received biography
of guitarist Bert Jansch containing much interesting detail of the folk and
blues club scene in London in the early 1960s which provides the background to
show how Jansch developed into the highly influential guitarist's guitarist
that he later became. Harper adopts a similar and even more detailed approach
in this book. Beginning with McLaughlin's first musical efforts in Monkseaton
on a guitar handed down from his brother, at the age of 15 was turning up at a
local jazz club in a pub on Sundays nights and asking to be allowed to sit in
(where was that, I wonder?). Then at 16, having bought a second hand guitar in
Windows, he joined Pete Deuchar's 'Professors of Ragtime' and quickly ended up
in London .
At the time London was the melting pot for musicians of
all kinds and most of them survived by doing sessions as backing musicians during
the day and then playing in jazz, blues or folk clubs at night.
It is a bit strange now to find
out that McLaughlin played on pop hits such as Herman's Hermits No Milk Today, Donovan's Mellow Yellow and Englebert Humperdinck’s
Release Me, as well as records by Tom
Jones, Petula Clark and many others. Harper's level of research is highly
impressive and covers these activities in exhaustive (and sometimes exhausting)
detail and I must admit there were times when I wasn't really bothered whether
it was McLaughlin, Big Jim Sullivan or Jimmy Page who had played rhythm guitar
on a Petula Clark single that never actually got released. However, where his
research and interviews with musicians really come into their own is in the fascinating
descriptions of the other musical activities and collaborations that were going
on. In the 1960s the London
music scene was the place to be for musicians of all styles and influences
(from Brian Auger to Zoot Money as BSH might say). The list of people who were
there is a Who's Who of later jazz, blues and rock greats: Graham Bond, Alexis
Korner, Eric Clapton, Dick Heckstall-Smith, Jack Bruce, Ginger Baker, Dave
Holland, Danny Thompson and Jimi Hendrix were just a few of the musicians
McLaughlin played with at this time. Ian and Mike Carr also feature, as well as
other members of EMCEE 5 and Jacky Denton.
Everyone played with everyone
else at clubs like the Flamingo and the Marquee and, of course, Ronnie Scott's. The original Ronnie's became the Old
Place for younger experimental musicians when the
main club moved to Frith Street .
Round the corner John Stevens and the Spontaneous Music Ensemble were operating
an open free-jazz house in the Little Theatre Club. Groups formed and evolved
and dissolved in the space of a few weeks. People shared houses and flats and
everyone jammed with everyone else. According to Harper, McLaughlin was both a part
of this scene and a bit outside it. Other musicians saw him as different but
also recognised that he was something special as a guitar player. Eventually
both for personal reasons and because he could no longer endure playing as a
session musician, McLaughlin left London
in early summer 1968 and returned to his mother's house in the North East. When
he returned to London a few months later a musician called Howard Blake, who
hadn't seen him for some time, asked where he'd been and apparently McLaughlin
replied (with some artistic licence) 'I've been up in Whitley Bay for two
years. I've been playing on the beach, working out my own guitar style'. (Maybe
this explains why he started to play so fast - it was an effort to keep his
hands warm while sitting on the Long Sands). Then, on February 16 1969,
McLaughlin went to New York
and two days later he was playing with Miles Davis on the recording of In A
Silent Way
The last few chapters of the book
deal with the various manifestations of the Mahavishnu Orchestra and the
influence of the guru, Sri Chinmoy, on McLaughlin's life and music at this
particular time. There is a nice story of a gig that the Mahavishnu Orchestra
played in Newcastle
City Hall Whitley
Bay
This book is a fascinating read
as well as a great reference book of a special musical time and place, and as a
major bonus there is a dedicated web site - www.bathedinlightning.com
- with extra material, pictures and rare audio and video of John McLaughlin
playing with various groups.
JC
2 comments :
This is a great book. I was honoured not only to have my interview with John for Prog magazine mentioned a couple times but also my account of my sister ringing up him also included in the book, as JC mentions above. You can read the original blogpost which Colin Harper quotes here here
Wow, what an insight!!
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