The Truth Comes Out

The Truth Comes Out

It is amazing that John McLaughlin has not become more renowned than he already is. He’s the most thoroughly progressive genius of that instrument ever. And at this point in rock history, when dynamite guitar players sell on the open market for much less than a dime a dozen, a person who has taken the instrument so far beyond traditional limitation would seem to be a godsend.

Admittedly, McLaughlin has been around for some time now; longer than the average super-hype musician, as long as people likeClapton and the Stones. And he’s played with some of the most progressive English bands in existence. For several years he played in England and on the continent with the Graham Bond Organisation, the guitar player in a band that featured Bond on organ, Jack Bruce on bass and Ginger Baker on drums.

Amerikans first became aware of McLaughlin through the combined auspices of Tony Williams and Miles Davis. Featured as a guitarist on the first Williams’ Lifetime LP (Emergency!), which although not entirely successful did at least serve to impress with its ideas, and on Miles Davis’ quietly beautiful In A Silent Way (his playing on the title cut an awesome challenge to the tens of thousands of note run guitarists presently plaguing the planet), dedicated jazz buffs have been talking about him for over a year.

“Dave Holland left England to join Miles’ band,” he says by way of explaining his presence in the States. “But before he left he made a demo tape with myself and Jack De Johnette, who is now drumming with Miles’ band.”

After Holland left England to play with Davis, McLaughlin continued to tour England. In January of ’69, Tony Williams called him to say “I’ve got a record date”. That was how the Lifetime was formed, initially as a trio with Larry Young, the astral perfect organist, as the third member. While cutting that date he also went in and did the Miles Davis tracks for Silent Way. “The album wasn’t as good as we expected,” he says of Emergency!. “The mix was all wrong for this kind of instrumentation we’ve got.”

Since then, it’s been a matter of getting the Lifetime’s music together, playing dates and appearing on both his own new album (Devotion on Douglas) and Miles’ stellar Bitches Brew. Miles thought enough of him to name one of that record’s tracks after him, the highest sort of compliment Miles could pay.

The feeling is definitely mutual. McLaughlin calls Davis, “Inspiring. Miles has always knocked me out. His music is to the point of vastest understatement. He’s a supreme artist, like Picasso. He can say so much with one little line, it’s miraculous how he does, but he does.”

“He’s a very disciplined person. He can really raise the feeling in a studio. He’ll come in at 10 a.m. and raise the spirit, he’ll really abuse you. He’s a great psychologist.”

And strangely enough, when speaking of Davis, Johnny uses a word almost no one has ever used to describe the man. “Humility. I’ve experienced it in him.”

While doing his own album and all the others, McLaughlin also found time to play on Wayne Shorter’s ethereally beautiful Supernova and on bassist’ Miroslav Vitous’ first solo effort, for Herbie Mann’s Embryo label. McLaughlin music, tieing together both jazz and rock as it does seems to be inspiring the same kind of respect and admiration in every sort of musician. Deservedly so.

His own album, Devotion, is a swirling mass of guitar, bass, drums, organ energy, really unlike anything that’s been done before. McLaughlin attributes it, in his unusually modest - manner, to “God”, in a cosmic sense. “Now I’m on a path. Before I was going unguided. I’ve always played on intuition, now I’m playing on guided intuition. I realize now that we don’t do, I don’t do anything. The Supreme does everything. When I play, it’s bad. When I let God play, it’s incredible. I want to let God play constantly.

“I’ve experienced it many times; I’ve disappeared and the spiritual took over. It’s beyond joy.”

What he found out, through his master, Srichinmoy, was that “This state of being was controllable. I’ve got to get myself into the right shape — spiritually, physically, mentally, intellectually. Then I could play like that all the time. We’re all one, in fact, and what the music does is, the sound embraces you. The people in the club are one with the music and the music’s in them.”

John isn’t alone in searching the spiritual realm for his music; Larry Young is a devout Muslim and Williams is . . .well, Tony’s always been, as McLaughlin puts it, a “naturally soulful” person. As for Jack Bruce: “Jack’s extremely soulful. I used to play with him years ago. Graham Bond was playing Hammond organ then, eight years ago. He had a big Hammond organ with Leslie speakers. I had these huge amps specially made. They were fantastically loud. Ginger was playing plexiglas drums and Jack played acoustic bass. He played so hard that he got callouses on callouses. He did it — he came through.”

Bruce came to the Williams’ group, where he apparently plans to stay, through the instigation of, again, John McLaughlin. “He came on tour with Larry Coryell, Mitch Mitchell and Mike Mandel. I’d known Larry for some time and he told me that he (Bruce) was gonna have a tour, yTcnow. Tony already knew Jack and I used to play with him, of course. So I talked to him and said “I know Tony would dig you to play on a track.” So I called Tony and said Jack would play with us. That week we did a number of things in the studio. And finally we just said ‘Why don’t you play in the band all the time?’ ”

The Williams Band, live, is a stunning experience. Easily the loudest band since Cream, the Lifetime is a total barrage upon the senses. McLaughlin opens up first, like a gunslinger with an incredible burst of speed. The music launches itself from simple but unusual chord changes with the accent on dissonance and pure force.

Bruce seems more comfortable here than with any band since early Cream — true, he is forced to take a backseat to Williams’ constant complexity of percussive effects and Young’s interplanetary organ blasts, often as not, but he more than adequately holds down the bottom, keeping the music relatable on any sort of level.

Williams, small and wiry, not unlike his mentor, Miles Davis, is one blur of frenzied speed throughout the set; riding above McLaughlin’s waves of energy/feedback (pure sound) he later sinks lower into the band’s sound while McLaughlin pushes the audience into either relating or getting the hell out.

Larry Young’s soloing is more traditionally third-stream (if new music has a tradition) than McLaughlin, probably due to the more frequent application of the organ to the sound. Yet his playing is more intense than most, cohesive yet rambling, loose the way someone like Shepp or Ayler might be loose, tight the way people like the Davis rhythm section might be tight.

It’s totally unlike any rock band you’ve ever heard, unless you can relate to that music in terms of a concept of total energy. It’s also unlike any jazz; no horns, guitar based, it’s close to a true jazz-rock band in that respect.

High-energy? Hell yes! “I know what’s possible right now and the possibilities are constantly growing. People, musicians, people of like spirit are bound to come together to do it. That’s the most important thing, to fulfill outselves. If I can fulfill myself and know that I’m fulfilling god at the same time. We’re just beginning.”

Speaking of bringing people of like spirit together, the most colossal mindblower gathering of total musical talent ever brought together will occur shortly when the Tony Williams Lifetime appears with Miles Davis and Eric Clapton at Randall’s Island Pop Festival, in New York.

The whole thing was nearly blown by a Rolling Stone article which had Bruce accusing Miles of wanting to be a “pop star” (no one who knows Miles would ever say that; he IS a star.) But it’s still going to happen. “We’re all very happy that we’ve brought two extremes like Eric and Miles together. I’m very happy. They’d never get to play together under ordinary circumstances.”

As for the supposed battle of the destroyer guitarists (people have been saying that Clapton can’t stand on the same stage with McLaughlin and assorted nonsense), “You cannot compare people,” McLaughlin insists, correctly. “It’s just two people. It’s a breakdown. The stylistic thing is what must be broken down.”

Whatever, the entire context of the show should be raised to the very highest level. There’s nearly as much anticipation of the show now as there was over the Stones coming over last year and a huge crowd can be expected. Which is really important.

McLaughlin, Williams, Davis, Young — none of them are anywhere near as well-known as their talents deserve. Certainly, the McLaughlin ablum, as well as the new Tony Williams’ record (Turn It Over) is receiving extensive airplay in some cities. But for the mass rock audience, the Randall’s Island thing should be a chance to hear the most progressive music of the sixties played; for many it will undoubtedly be a first time experience and that’s a shame and a sham. Certainly, listening to Devotion, McLaughlin’s incredible strength as a guitarist is almost painfully obvious. And his unique grasp of the rock situation (Buddy Miles is his drummer on that record) is indeed enlightening; a total energy concept once again, but this time one that works on a multiplicity of levels. There’s no way you can hold the planetary masters back and Devotion proves it.

As John McLaughlin says, “When the truth comes out, the Truth comes out.”

Dave Marsh