John McLaughlin's new CD "Now Here This" features 8 scorching originals from a master technician. We'll sample several tracks!

 

It has been nearly two years since world-renowned guitarist John McLaughlin released To the One, his highly acclaimed, first studio recording, with The 4th Dimension. The veteran guitar aficionado celebrates his 70th birthday year in 2012 with the release of Now Here This (Abstract Logix), as he ups the ante even further with greater fire, finesse and freewheeling interplay.

McLaughlin's musical influences carry over to many of the musical elite, with Jeff Beck declaring him in 2010 to be ''the best guitarist alive.'' In 2003, McLaughlin was ranked 49th in Rolling Stone magazine list of the 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time and in the summer of 2007, McLaughlin performed at Eric Clapton's Crossroads Guitar Festival in Bridgeview, Illinois. Chick Corea remarked to DownBeat Magazine that ''...what John McLaughlin did with the electric guitar set the world on its ear. No one ever heard an electric guitar played like that before, and it certainly inspired me. John's band, more than my experience with Miles, led me to want to turn the volume up and write music that was more dramatic and made your hair stand on end.''