A love supreme

Continuing my trip back in time through the album charts

03/08/73 : Love Devotion Surrender - Carlos Santana & John McCloughlin

I'm aware of Mr Santana but don't recognise Mr McCloughlin as a name, but suspect he'll have been someone in something back in the day - I'm expecting some guitar-y noodling accompanied by whatever instrument Johnny Boy plays.  But before we do that, we have a compilation album to consider...

Straight in at #1 is That'll Be The Day by various artists which appears to be a double album of 50s/60s rock and roll-ish tracks.  And I can't see how that hits any of my criteria for listening to - which is a good job, because I can't find it anywhere (although I can find a million Buddy Holly compilations with the same title).  Ah - a bit more research tells me it was the soundtrack to the film of the same title - slightly more culturally relevant, but still not enough to make me listen to it!  So back to finding out what instrument Johnny Boys plays...

Ah - he plays guitar too, so it's a double helping of noodles.  Playing some John Coltrane tracks (amongst others), so it's an all-you-can-eat-and-more noodle buffet.  There are undoubted levels of skill on display, but I'm aware nothing would ever convince me to endure this again.  Sorry - but it's a pretty cool album cover though!  And there's more than a hint of young Noel Gallagher to Mr McLoughlin (and yes, I know it's really the other way round).

We're at #9 in the chart this week on their third week of a seven week run - feels about right, although I'm surprised it peaked as high as #7 (in its debut week).  The top five this week are That'll Be The Day (coming to the end of SEVEN week run at #1, after which it mysteriously dropped out of the charts, never to be seen again), Peters & Lee, Bowie, The Carpenters and Bowie and the highest new entry was Mott The Hoople (#11).  No new women in the charts this week, although we do have a different appearance from Linda as part of Wings - that's as much change as you can expect around here on that front!

Wikipedia tells me that both men were followers of Sri Chimnoy (oh yeah, him) and this record is both inspired by their faith and a tribute to John Coltrane.  It also tells me that whilst Carlos originally hailed from Mexico and moved to California, John (who played with The Mahavishnu Orchestra, who we have surprisingly met before) hailed from the somewhat more exotic climes of Doncaster.  The album was met with mixed critical reviews with some loving it whilst others were not so keen - apparently it was a "plink-plonk conga-heavy foursquare vamp".  Whatever that is.  Amusingly, for an album featuring two talented guitarists, many critics thought Larry Young, the organist, did the best work.

"Customers also listened to" mostly Santana albums, it appears - there's millions of the bloody things!  I appreciated the skill involved here but not the sound they made whilst being skilful, I'm afraid.

29/07/73 - Yeah.  Fine.  Whatever.
12/08/73 - A sunny afternoon kind of an album