JOHN MCLAUGHLIN & CARLOS SANTANA - A LIVE SUPREME, LIVE AT CHICAGO 1973

Recorded after their collaboration, this recording has appeared under different facets (as have many of Santana's records) sometimes as a single disc, some others as a double, covering the entire concert. The major difference in the line-up is that Billy Cobham holds the drum stool instead of Shrieve on the studio album.

As you'd expect, such an improvisational studio album could only give out an even more improvised and extended version of those songs. Indeed extended wailing soaring & searing guitar solos, extended drums and percussion duos, and many more indulgent musical traits are all part of this album. Particularly enjoyable is the Coltrane track Naima that gets a brilliant interpretation, but does indeed stray a little away from the original. All four tracks are very interesting but not fundamentally different that on the studio album.

In general the sound quality is acceptable, although I've heard some different quality in different versions, you can bet that some non-legit ones are most likely least likely to be proper-sounding. The opening minutes of Live Divine are not always well recorded because of the extreme dynamics of the band on stage. The Jazz-Door label (German) version (JD 1250) has a satisfactory sound and should please many fans.