…the next move, after Manuel Gottsching’s E2-E4, pulls the thread of that piece’s guitar work and comes up with Gabor Szabo at his funky six-string best, in Stockholm in 1972. From the album Small World (available as a compilation with its sister album, Belsta River, as In Stockholm), “Impressions Of My Country / Foothill Patrol” is a duel with Janne Schaffer — a Swedish guitar hero known mostly for his work with Abba. In 1972 Szabo, a serious jazz cat with a penchant for interpreting pop tunes (and riding that line between elevator music and the sublime), might have been primed to explore this Hendrixian territory. The previous year his “Gypsy Queen,” from the album Spellbinder (Impulse, 1966), had been adapted to round out Santana’s cover of “Black Magic Woman” on the album Abraxas. That song reached number four on the charts, while Abraxas went to number one. Szabo’s approach on Small World may have been, in no small part, influenced by Santana. The usually clean tones are fuzzed out, wah-wah pedals are employed, and there is a freer, funkier feel to the proceedings. Coming from Szabo, though, it’s no surprise, and his experimentation with tone and feedback in the 60s, coupled with the use of his native eastern European melodies, helped define a psychedelic sensibility that lent itself to the jam.
Progarchy 