John McLaughlin x Jack DeJohnette x Dave Holland - 1968/1969 Jam session

This is one set i really love, it's about 25 mintes and seems to be a radio broacast from a club or maybe a even an in-studio live broadcast. Either way it's a really good sounding Soundboard. While i'm a fan of the first Mahavishnu Orchestra incarnation, I sometime felt they could at times become too virtuosistic for their owng good. That's understandable considering you had one of the best guitarist/composers of alltime, perhaps the best jazz/fusion drummer of all time in Billy Cobham, and Jan Hammer and Jerry Goodman was definitely nothing to scoff at. The only member I felt was just taking up space (though he was competent enough) was Rick Laird. But its extremely rarely I revisittheir music despite having all thier records. For me its something missing on there for mch of it. Keith Jarrett had a quote about the Miles Davis band with Steve Grossman, Chick Corea, Dave Holland and Jack De Johnette that was (and i para-phrase) - "they all had great solos but it felt like they were in separate closets playing". And that's kind of my vibe with Mahavishnu on their worst days (don't get me wrong, "Inner Mountain Flame" is truly a classic record though).

McLaughlin's and Cobham's simulaneous work with Miles Davis when McLaughlin reached stateside and onwards are always of the higest quality thoughout (John's work with Larry Young and Tony Williams in Lifetime really got my eggs frying too). Both John and Cohham were given more subdued roles but this isntead resulted in them utilizing their full potential in my opinion. Now to the musical session at hand...

The 26 minutes set feature a quartet of highly talented musicians and has circulated on the internet for several years by now, But there is some real controversy on when it was made and with who. The usual culprits named to be involed are McLaughlin (g) with Chick Corea (p), Dave Holland (b) and Jack DeJohnette (d) - the Miles quintet of the day. And aural evidence pointing to this being feasible, However the set has since it first begun to circulate on places like Dime been purported to have been recorded in New York City on 1968-10-28. Anyyone that knows their history of John McLaughlin or even Miles Davis fusion years know that John McLaughlin didn't appear from hs homeland of England until about February 1969 (a few days before the "In A Silent Way" sessions). So either the personell is wrong, the date is wrong or the city and even country is wrong.

I'm 90% sure that is Da Holland on accoustic bass, and I would be suprised if that isn't Jack De Johnette playing the trap set as well. To my ears it does sound like Corea but sometimes it can be hard to hear individual styles on the elctric piano (listen for example to the aforementioned "In A Silent Way", "Bitches Brew" and "On The Corner" and you'll see that it's a lot harder to pick out Herbie Hancock, Joe Zawinul, Larry Young and Corea than had they played accoustic). Doing research for this I have come up with two pausible scenarios. It's a known fact that Dave Holland and McLaughlin was part of the same music scene in England back before they both expadited and found suceess in the US. Jack DeJonete was playing drums in the Bill Evans Trio in 1968, and a band featuring Dave Holland opened up for them as the opening ac( forgot the name). This was at Ronnie Scotts and this was also the gig that Miles Davis became awae of Holland and asked him to come to New York City as soon as possible. Considering the music here sounds more like John's excellent (and very overlooked debut "Extrapoalition") than his later material, an impromptou jam session on October 28, 1968 between the aforementioned trio and an unknown piano planuer sounds feasible. But there is also another option, This has also been the tape that Miles got his hands on that made him want both John and Dave in his group. So maybe after hearing them on the bandstand (Holland Deohnette that is) Miles set up time for recording for a demo that would land on his desk.

There is however one more option. I'll be damned if I can find it now, but some US magazine ran a small  article on McLaghlin or Corea sometime in 1969 where they were asked about future projects. Their answer, amongst other sessions that actually came to fruition, was the fact that they was going into the studio in a few days (John, Chick, Dave and Jack) to record some solo stuff. This has never surfaced, and consdiering th relative pristine sound on quality here could this be that unreleased studio sssion, I guess we'll never know but at least the music is a monster so press play, TURN IT UP and enjoy!.

01. "Les Catacombes" (Part One)
02: "Les Catacombes" (Part Two)
03. "Godies Boots"

JOHN MCLAUGHLIN Jam w. Holland, DeJonette (& Corea?) *
* Click townload