Skilled guitarist Billy McLaughlin joins DJ Free to produce another of superb SoulFood collaborative CD. Delicate acoustic guitar melodies are the focal feature in the eleven instrumental tracks, accompanied by synthesizer, keyboards, chimes, and nature sounds. The guitar performances are sublime and soft, and demonstrate McLaughlin’s skill at crafting melodies that are both haunting and lovely.
The CD opens with the seductive “White Bear.” The next track “Into the Blue, Out of the Blue” is lighter and more optimistic, with light riffs that curl around the main melody. Track 4, “The Pond”, gives the sense of a person looking over the water at sunset as birds fly home for the evening. On “Inhale Pink,” McLaughlin juxtaposes a delicately transposed guitar motif with strummed chords that feel like a contemporary chorale.
This CD is wonderful for rituals and meditations, but also for simply relaxing with a glass of wine while watching a sunset. The recording was so popular that Guitar Meditations 2 was released in 2005, and Guitar Meditations 3 in 2010.
~review by Elizabeth Hazel
SoulFood 2001
(54:50 minutes)
