Larry Carlton-Alone But Never Alone (1985)

Larry Carlton is one of the great jazz guitarists. His versatile style and immense talent have been demonstrated throughout a fruitful career spanning more than 50 years, leaving behind over thirty solo albums that have explored jazz fusion, jazz rock, blues, and rock. In addition to his solo albums, he has been a prolific session musician, collaborating on hundreds of recordings for other artists, including Steely Dan, Al Jarreau, Michael Franks, Spyro Gyra, and Randy Crawford, among many others. He has even composed various soundtracks for television and film series, such as the famous "Hill Street Blues", for which he won a Grammy Award in 1981. His first album, "With a Little Help from My Friends", released in 1968, was met with great acclaim from both audiences and critics worldwide. In the early 1970s, he joined the jazz-rock band The Crusaders, with whom he recorded eleven albums, beginning with "Crusaders 1" (1972) and ending with "Those Southern Knights" (1976). However, on the latter, he appeared as a guest musician, and he continued to participate in subsequent albums with the group, contributing his own compositions and melodic style with his famous Gibson ES-335 guitar. Carlton himself nicknamed this guitar "Mr. 335", even creating his own recording studio, which he called "Room 335". After leaving The Crusaders, Larry Carlton signed with Warner Bros. and released a string of great albums focused on jazz fusion. Among these albums, highlights include the debut “Larry Carlton” (1978), the live album “Mr. 335: Live in Japan” (1979), and the brilliant “Sleepwalk” (1981), “Strikes Twice” (1981), “Eight Times Up” (1983), and “Friends” (1983). All of them feature exquisite production, brimming with rich nuances and a wide variety of styles, encompassing jazz, rock, funk, soul, and blues. In 1985, with his ninth album, “Alone But Never Alone”, he reached number one on the Billboard Jazz charts, and even won another Grammy Award for the track “Minute by Minute”. He also received a nomination in the “Best Jazz Fusion Performance” category for his live album “Last Nite” (1986). In the late 1980s, he released his most rock-oriented album to date, "On Solid Ground", but before its release, an event occurred that would mark Larry Carlton's life. One night, outside the recording studio, an unknown assailant shot him several times, nearly killing him. This dramatic event led to a long hospitalization followed by endless and painful recovery sessions. Some time later, the guitarist began to rebuild his personal and professional life, drastically reducing his live appearances, although he gradually resumed his career as a session musician, reaching an astonishing number of nearly three thousand collaborations by the mid-1990s. At the end of the 20th century, he participated in the Fourplay project, a jazz supergroup formed by Bob James, Nathan East, and Harvey Mason, with whom he recorded a total of ten albums.