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| Artist: John Mclaughlin
Label: Abstract Logix
Category: Music
List Price: £15.99
Buy New: £10.29
You Save: £5.70 (36%)
New (17) Used (3) from £8.91
Rating:  12 reviews
Sales Rank: 3594
Media: Audio CD
Discs: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.1
Dimensions (in): 5.4 x 4.8 x 0.6
UPC: 827912075106
EAN: 0827912075106
ASIN: B00158K146
Release Date: June 30, 2008
Shipping: Eligible for Super Saver Shipping
Availability: Usually dispatched within 24 hours
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| Customer Reviews:
 Can't breath, a suffocating mess. June 24, 2008
2 out of 5 found this review helpful
The John McLaughlin finally arrived and a big disappointment. I have the DVD making of the album which is great. But the CD is just a mess. It's all Indian musicians playing with him but there is no space to breath. The drummer is amazing but frightened of leaving any silence or gaps. Great enthusisams, technical ability, precision, passion from all involved but in the end its just one big technical exercise in how well they can all play.
As for JM, when will he just stop palying guitar synth and play the guitar which he does so well.
 guitar synth frenetic exercise June 18, 2008
With the greatest of respect for his work,where does this production stand? Firstly, the actual production of the CD does not demonstrate the quality of Industrial Zen for example, more recently, or of any of his early work with Columbia. The digital production system does not achieve depth, resonance or radiance. Once again all credits for composition are given to John McLaughlin, and his authorial control has been consistent throughout his career since Mahavishnu. Despite the range of Indian musicians, the style continues from Industrial Zen rather than Shakti. More importantly and substantially, the guitar synth used throughout the production fails to create any warmth, as can be expected of course, and in this sense this production is an exercise by John McLauglin, who it appears, has already made his statement musically, and now is enchanted by domestic life and the joys of fatherhood, judging by his nursery CD. For a man now 68, we are grateful to have seen him in concert performance with Mahavishnu and more recently. We have collected almost his entire production of some sublime musical expression. Any serious student of jazz-fusion will find many treasures in his catalogue, but this production certainly is not his best.
Guitar synth ? Please No! June 12, 2008
5 out of 11 found this review helpful
I bought this album partially due to the 5 star ratings posted for this album and also because I attended John McLaughlin and the 4th Dimension at Londons Barbican Centre May 2008. The Live concert was McLaughlin doing what he does best - play great jazz guitar with a superb band! Sadly the cd is a rather damp guitar synth riddled musical effort the band are great but McLaughlin himself uses awful synth voices all the way through. The same material with traditional guitar sounds would of been a huge improvement but it's too late for 'Floating Point'. I own almost everything he has produced over the last 4 decades and I can say this will be ignored by the hardcore Mclaughlin fans! Please stick to real guitar sounds JOHN and leave the synth noises for the keyboard players :-)
The downloadable Official Pirate of J Mclaughlin & 4th Dimension is a truly great album but sadly isn't planned for cd release :-(
 Lost it June 9, 2008
4 out of 18 found this review helpful
The brutal truth is McLaughlin hasn't made a decent album in years and claiming this piece of drivel is one of his best merely demonstrates how far removed from reality he is. This rubbish might be fine for the not so critical US market where smooth jazz dominates but for the rest of us it just proves a once mighty talent in terminal decline.
 Consistently stimulating June 2, 2008
10 out of 12 found this review helpful
I bought this at John McLaughlin's show in London on Saturday, on the penultimate European date of his tour with his new 4th Dimension band. The overwhelming impact of that concert was extraordinary: the interplay between the musicians (including JM's erstwhile colleague Dominique di Piazza standing in on bass for an injured Hadrien Feraud), the sheer power of the playing (culminating in McLaughlin's furious solo over a drum duet from Mark Mondesir and Gary Husband) and the feeling of being in the presence of one of the world's master musicians who has consistently sought to reinvent and redirect himself as he strives to - as he's said in a recent interview - use music to build a bridge between the inner and outer world.
This record (his fortieth, according to some reckoning) represents yet another manifestation of his technical inventiveness and inspiration. Following on from 2006's "Industrial Zen", it seems to have much in common with that set (even the sleeves have similar colours, to take the most superfical viewpoint), which was a return to jazz fusion following the Euro-classical "Thieves And Poets" and the extended period of work with his Indian band, Remember Shakti. The early stages of that group overlapped with his previous fusion project with Heart Of Things, whose recordings provide another point of reference for this set.
But, as is often the case in his lengthy career, there's an unusual twist: this record was made with Indian musicians (and one or two from the West, including Feraud) in India, but they're playing fusion. The result is a consistently stimulating mixture of Western backbeats and complicated Eastern polyrhythms, over which McLaughlin unreels his characteristic sinuous lead lines. Sometimes he's using a clean, bright guitar tone, while at others he's playing the guitar synthesizer, imitating the sound of keyboards or trumpet.
Most of these tracks feature him duetting with guest musicians, including George Brooks on sax, Debashish Bhattacharya on Hindustani slide guitar, U. Ragesh (brother of Remember Shakti's U. Srinivas) on electric mandolin and Naveen Kumar on bansuri flute. Remember Shakti's vocalist, Shankar Mahadevan, is highlighted on The Voice, a track which recycles the riff from Mother Nature, his showcase on Industrial Zen. And the set's closer, Five Peace Band (a track which was also in Remember Shakti's repertoire) incorporates a blistering duet with Niladri Kumar on electic sitar. Each of these guests bring a subtle variation to the music, highlighting the extraordinary talent of the leader and the sheer exuberance of this date as exciting musical connections are made across genres, continents and ages.
McLaughlin has said this might be the best record he's ever made; while this might be a touch of marketing hype (and it's certainly too early to do more than a cursory comparison with his wide-ranging back catalogue), I think that it's a brilliantly stimulating, interesting, entertaining disc which can be recommended unreservedly.
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