Bill Laswell is someone who has been on the edge of my musical consciousness ever since the 1980s when he produced and played bass on albums by Laurie Anderson, PIL, The Golden Palominos and one of my favourite albums – Swans: The Burning World. Some more adventurous of my friends had albums by Material, Painkiller, and some of his ambient dub albums in the 90s and gradually I became aware of the wide scope of his musical collaborations and explorations. It seemed there was barely a country or genre where he hasn’t been involved in drawing together different musicians and forms. Here are just some of the more familiar ones:

Afrika Bambaataa, Bob Marley, Brian Eno, Carlos Santana, David Byrne, Dub Syndicate, Gil Scott-Heron, Ginger Baker, Herbie Hancock, Jah Wobble, John Zorn, Lee “Scratch” Perry, Manu Dibango, Mick Jagger, Miles Davis, Motorhead, New York Gong, Nona Hendryx, Paul Bowles, Peter Gabriel, Pharoah Sanders, The Ramones, Robert Miles, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Sly and Robbie, Sting, Talvin Singh, The Last Poets, Tom Verlaine, Tony Williams, Whitney Houston, William S. Burroughs, Yoko Ono, Zakir Hussain

His inventive and uninhibited spirit seems not just to draw out the best of others, but also to » Continue Reading.