“When I was coming of age as a guitarist, it was the time of the eclectic bills at the Fillmore and the hippie ’60s,” says Scofield. “Back then you’d meet a rock player, but he would also be into John Coltrane and Doc Watson. The hippie mentality seemed to embrace all music. Sure, maybe it was naïve, but I remember the cool people talking about every style, and I feel the current jam band scene is an extension of that outlook.”

For his latest release, This Meets That [EmArcy], Sco deploys his trio featuring bassist Steve Swallow and drummer Bill Stewart, with whom he recorded the brilliant 2004 live album En Route. And although This Meets That falls more squarely in the jazz camp than his dalliances with Medeski, Martin, & Wood, Sco’s covers of the Rolling Stones’ “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction,” Charlie Rich’s “Behind Closed Doors,” and a killing version of “House of the Rising Sun” (which features guest star Bill Frisell), demonstrate that the guitarist isn’t bound by any genre distinctions. In fact, Scofield seems to revel in the fact that he can do what he wants, when he wants, as proven by his latest interest—slide.

I was surprised to see you playing slide onstage with MM&W. What’s the story with that?
I just dig slide guitar. I’d been curious about it for many years, but I never even tried it. When I started the MM&W tour, I was just looking for something else to do. So I went into a music store and bought a Warren Haynes instructional book/CD and started messing around. But I don’t consider myself a slide master by any means—it’s hard [laughs].

What’s the toughest part?
Playing in tune and right-hand muting. I’m even more amazed at what guys like Warren, Derek Trucks, and Roy Rogers can do. I play in standard tuning, and I don’t practice it all the time, but it’s a fun thing to have on the gig. Sometimes I get real brave and take a bunch of my solo with the slide, but invariably I throw it on the floor and play regular! I view slide like an effect.

You’ve said that Steve Swallow has been as big an influence on you as anyone. Does playing with him push you into areas that other bass players don’t?
I met Steve at Berklee College of Music when I was in my early 20s. He and Gary Burton were the first famous jazz pros I ever met. Thankfully I ended up jamming with Steve, and he took an interest in my playing and really nurtured me as a musician. We’ve played together on and off since 1973.

But the thing is, everyone I play with pushes me, and we all enlighten each other, whether it’s Steve, Bill Stewart, Bill Frisell, or John Medeski. I love their playing and I thrive on that—all jazz musicians do. Good players push you into other areas because they hold their own playing to such a high standard. And when you get a chance to play with them, you have to try and be as good as you can be. See, as much as every guitarist plays along with records, that method is no substitute for sharing the stage with someone whose playing you admire and hearing them approach the same tunes you’re approaching on a nightly basis. It’s like going into combat with someone.

Jazz is such a live experience. How has your approach to capturing it in the studio evolved?
It hasn’t. I’ve just gotten better at capturing the live moments in the studio because I’ve been able to keep making albums. I’ve played gigs night-in night-out for more than 30 years, so you get good at that, but I would only go into the studio every few months. So it’s taken a while, but I think it’s simply a matter of comfort and doing it live in the studio more.

What did you use to track This Meets That?
I used my signature Ibanez JSM100 through a rented ’59 Fender Twin. I’ve been using a Vox AC30 live for a couple of years but I like this particular Twin a lot. I’m always mixing it up. On my last record, That’s What I Say: John Scofield Plays the Music of Ray Charles, I miked up three amps—the same Twin, an AC30, and a Fender Deluxe—and mixed them all together. That was the producer, Steve Jordan’s idea. But for This Meets That, we didn’t have as much time to track, so I wanted to keep it simple. My pedalboard has a Boomerang Plus phrase sampler, a Digi-Tech Whammy pedal, a Boss chorus, and an Ibanez EQ pedal that I use when I want more treble. For distortion, I was using an Xotic Effects AC Booster, but I just started using my old Pro Co Rat again.

Have you experimented with different pick and string gauges over the years?
Oh yeah. I started with medium Fender picks in my younger years, and then I began experimenting with different thicknesses for a bigger sound. Eventually I started using heavy teardrop-shaped picks because someone told me they were jazz picks, but as the years went on my picks got even bigger and harder. Now I’m using a 1.14 MM green Dunlop Tortex pick. For rhythm stuff, if I remember to do it, I’ll use a lighter pick for a nice texture difference, but I always seem to forget [laughs].

I started out with real slinky strings trying to play the blues as a kid, then I started upping the gauges in my fusion years. Then, in the ’90s, they got heavier. About ten years ago, I started using .013s on the top and a .052 on the bottom. But I go back and forth quite a bit. With MM&W I’m using a stock D’Adarrio .011 set, whereas This Meets That was tracked with .013s—except for the cuts where I used a Thomastik George Benson .012 set of flatwounds! So obviously I mess around with string gauge quite a bit. Sometimes I even change gauges between the first and second set.

How would you quantify the sonic difference between flatwounds and roundwounds?
Well, flats are more dead sounding, but in a cool way. For example, the bass strings don’t jump out like they do with roundwounds, which, to my ears have a tendency to be very raucous, and uneven sounding compared to the unwound strings. But with flats, the low notes don’t stick out, and they decay with much more evenness in relation to the unwound strings. I think that’s a great benefit for jazz line playing.

How do you go about choosing a cover tune such as “Behind Closed Doors?”
I just love the tune. And if I really like a song, inevitably I’ll find myself sitting around and picking it out on guitar. Like everyone, I’ve had a big record collection and listened to all sorts of guitarists and singers over the decades, but over the years I’ve become braver and actually started doing more pop-type tunes. Plus, I’ve never done a country song. There are, however, country shadings in certain phrases I play because I’ve always loved that music.

You have been seen wielding a Telecaster onstage recently.
That’s true! It’s funny, because when I was in high school, I had a beautiful ’66 Fender Telecaster that I loved. I eventually sold it, and a few months ago, a guy from Texas contacted me and said he had a ’66 Telecaster that he believed once belonged to me. So when I was playing in Austin at Antone’s, this guy brought the guitar—in the original case—and sure enough, when he pulled it out, it was my old guitar! Antone’s has a house ’64 Fender Super Reverb and I plugged the Tele in and it sounded incredible. So at that point, of course, I had to ask the guy if I could buy it off of him. He says, “Well, I don’t really want to sell it—but for you, you can have it for market value—I want $14,000 and a John Scofield signature series Ibanez!” Needless to say, I just went out and bought a new Telecaster.