John McLaughlin went from London session work and guitar lessons for Jimmy Page to an all-night jam with Jimi Hendrix, the electric sessions of Miles Davis, and the founding of the Mahavishnu Orchestra. This episode traces the Yorkshire guitarist’s lifelong search for structure, from the classical records that anchored him after his parents separated to his rejection of free jazz as ‘devastating and anarchistic.’

We follow his devotion to Sri Chinmoy and the name Mahavishnu, the collapse of the orchestra amid songwriting disputes and a snapped double-neck guitar, and his acoustic reinvention with Shakti alongside L. Shankar and Zakir Hussain. Along the way we unpack odd time signatures, ragas, sympathetic strings, scalloped fretboards, Frank Zappa’s ‘machine gun’ critique, and the reunion with the father he lost contact with at age seven.

• How classical music became an emotional anchor for a seven-year-old after his parents separated
• Why McLaughlin walked away from the psychedelic scene and hated formless free jazz
• What he brought to Miles Davis and the birth of jazz fusion
• The Mahavishnu Orchestra’s rise, internal conflicts, and breakup
• Shakti, the customized guitar, and the feel-versus-technique debate with Zappa and Ritchie Blackmore