Hello! I went to see John McLaughlin & Free Spirits at the Bottom Line last night, February 28, the 10:30 show...I thought that they might play at least one or two songs from his latest album, "The Promise", but they didn't...so, I was wondering, does anyone out there know what the names of the songs they played were? There were probably six or seven pieces in the set...
BTW, it was an incredible show!! Dennis Chambers is a tride and true motherfucker behind the drums!! It was great to finally see one of my guitar heros live...and I loved the Mahavishnu reference in one of the songs!! Crank up the distortion more, John! We love it!!

Joe McGlinchey

From: gilles@netcom.com (Gilles Bacon)
To: SWWierenga@aol.com, Groove-B3@netcom.com
Date: 96-02-29 22:06:11 EST

Saw the Free Spirits last night at the Bottom Line! Smokin'! I'd never seen McLaughlin, and it's amazing to actually see him play, he's so great. I got his autograph after the show, and since he lives in Paris spoke to him in French. He said the concerts with Elvin Jones will never happen in the US!

This was a weird concert since 1/3 of the people came to see McLaughlin, 1/3 to see Chambers, and the rest to see Joey. Dennis Chambers kind of stole the show with a 15 minute solo which just blew everyone's mind: he got standing ovation. He's such a monster on the drums: in fact, he's the BOMB!

Joey was amazing as well, playing some of the fastest leads I've ever heard on organ. He impressed everyone with his trumpet solos, and I was surprised to see that for the encore, McLaughlin simply accompanied Joey who played a nice bluesy ballad on his red horn (is that Miles' trumpet?).

While I'm not overly impressed with musisians who can simply play incredibly fast leads, the feeling and improvisation between these virtuosos is something worth seeing!!! The show lasted less than 2 hours, but had enough energy to leave you more than satisfied.

Gilles
gROovE!

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Gilles F. Bacon                           ^Groove^: The Hammond Grounds
gilles@netcom.com                          http://www.webcom.com/groove
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