S&D: Miles Davis in the 70s & 80s

(Adam A., just those three? If nothing else you should definitely give In a Silent Way a try, and then Nefertiti and/or Miles Smiles. I mean, they're all brilliant, generally, but In a Silent Way in particular is the kind of album that...well, you just have to hear it. :-)

'Live Around the World' is a perfect summation of the 80s stuff, great tunes, performances and sound (and no crappy Marcus Miller drum programming).

I was surprised that I didn't like Black Beauty more, on the other hand -- something about the concert doesn't quite click for me, though there are plenty of moments I enjoy.

I haven't sat down to compare the two since buying the reissue but I bought it on a whim the other month despite already owning an older cd version, and it was far more exciting and less abrasive (abrasive not always being bad but in this case it caused me problems) to me than the older one. I don't think it would be an issue by this point, unless you buy used, but definitely go for the reissue.

or stay up all night manically grading student papers and listen to it repeating for hours on end. that might work with either version.

Also the In A Silent Way box is just amazing. Well worth it if you enjoy the album. It's more than just more of the same.

I've never really liked the 80s 'comeback' recs - Marcus Miller and Mike Stern don't really do it for me, although Scofield is ok, I have no prob. w/ 'Time After Time', and I did quite enjoy that late/last hip-hop rec the one time I heard it approx. 8 years ago.

But don't neglect the pre-68 stuff either! Just the other day I heard an amazing live alb recorded in France in abt 1960. Coltrane is still in the group, and he's REALLY starting to play in a most far out way, much to the horror/antipathy of the audience, who are not at all happy w/ JC blurting alongside the far 'cooler' Miles and Wynton Kelly. The tension is the same kind of feeling you get off some of those seventies live albs, that same kind of provocation.

I saw this DVD of an 80's performance once. Ewwww. He covered "Time After Time" and "Human Nature", which sounded just like the originals except there was an out-of-breath trumpet playing over them. What is Lauper without Lauper? Dismal. Anyway...

to return to your original question 'bout the '80s Miles,to my ears "Tutu" & "Amandla" sound more impressive (if certainly more 'polished' & less 'passionate' than the 70s ellectrified stuff) compared to the rest - tho' "You're Under Arrest" has it's purple patches too

"Aura" ain't bad, it's just essentially a recording where Miles mainly solos, inna impressionist stylee, over the (Miles-inspired) music written by the Norwegian trumpeter Palle Mikkelborg

wild ....fast...wild ....fast...wild ....fast...

Dark Magus is seriously fucked up. Luv it.

Also about his Human Nature cover, yeah that live video isn't that great, but the version on Live Around the World where he trades with/feeds phrases to Kenny Garrett is just fabulous.

I notice nobody stuck in a word about "In Concert: Live At Philharmonic Hall," a double-disc live set released right after "On The Corner" (which is my favorite Miles album, BTW). I think "In Concert" is a great, and very underrated, disc.

Lately I feel like 70s Miles records have everything I'm looking for in music.

I got the <I>Complete On The Corner Sessions</I> boxed set in today's mail. Six discs, at least three hours (I haven't added it all up yet) of previously unreleased studio jams from '72-74.

I saw the Sep release date at amazon!

It's amazing shit. I'm listening to "Jabali," an 11-minute previously unreleased track, right now. It has the same kind of slow, repeating bassline as "Ife," but with more crescendos from the drums.

dear unperson, I stalk now

I know little about the eighties stuff except for the covers of Top 40 songs. Which is the best?

Tutu and We Want Miles are my favorites. Tutu is icy, inhuman cyber-funk; We Want Miles is small-group funk-metal (one guitar, bass, drums, sax, and Miles all spidery and muted).

Thanks unperson. I'm kind of tired saying, "Oh, Miles in the '80s? ... Well, 'Time After Time' is pretty cool."

Complete On The Corner Sessions

hi dere i really need three hours of one vamp

!!!!!!!!

/hoos is mad amped

xpost YES YOU DO

I started listening to the OTC box on the train ride home. The new stuff that I heard is slower than, say, Agharta or Dark Magus, and more about the groove than the rawk (not enough skin-peeling Pete Cosey guitar solos for my taste, at least not yet), but man, it's fuckin' killer. Boxed set of my year, no question.

OK, Aura is quite good. The last three minutes of "Violet" are chilling.

Does In A Silent Way count (I think it's a 1969 release)? It's gorgeous and vibrant, and one of my favorite albums ever.

"calypso frelimo" may be the greatest song ever

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxSFSdcGPLM

I have devoured everything I can get my hands on by Miles Davis, but I have yet to breach the 1980s. I suppose I'm going to have to turn there sooner or later.

I'm fond of Aura.

'Live Around the World' is a perfect summation of the 80s stuff, great tunes, performances and sound (and no crappy Marcus Miller drum programming).

― Jordan (Jordan), Saturday, December 14, 2002 1:09 PM (7 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i still rep for this

(7 years ago!)

kinda crazy to watch al foster playing heavy rock like that. i wonder if he liked it.

yeah, i'd say that live around the world is my fave 80s miles, tho i haven't heard it all by any means. what i have heard is better than i expected, but i think i wasn't expecting much.

wow looks like a TON of live 70s Miles stuff went up on youtube in the past year.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGal87rfH_4&feature=related

Pete Cosey!

Just watched an old Ch4 documentary on Miles. Its really sad to witness the tour de force Miles from the 50's to the mid 70's turn into the 80's 90's Miles. You can see that it hurts him as well. I got into Miles backwards via Bitches Brew and On The Corner but now I really prefer his 2nd Quintet period + Kind Of Blue + In A Silent way. Cant bring myself to listen to his 80's stuff.

Me neither. I've devoured and obsessed over pretty much every era of Miles (maybe save for his 40s material when he was a good, but not yet great, trumpeter), but the 80s stuff I've heard makes me angry. Not so much at Miles -- after 40 years, why not a payday? -- but at whoever the fuck thought those production styles and those instantly dated digital-synth-based arrangements were a good idea.

As someone who has everything Miles did up until 75 and as someone who finds that the 74/75 band's recordings only get better as time passes, I too wrote off his 80's stuff for years. Last summer, I made a concerted effort to sit down with 80's Miles and really listen, because I had never given any of that stuff a chance previously. For the most part, I found that if you can remove the fact that you're listening to a Miles Davis album, most of them aren't too bad. Fairly listenable stuff. A lot of it has dated pretty poorly because of production techniques of the day (there are sequencers on almost every single album he did in the 80's — something that has no place in jazz, if you ask me), so again, I had to just not get upset and accept it on its own terms to get anything out of it.

The albums from the 80's that I found to be the best of the era are Star People and Amandla. Amandla, in particular, is a great example of something that's dated horribly, but the performances overcome it pretty easily. When you just focus on Miles, you'll some of his best soloing since the 70's. Just need to adjust to the musical backdrops. 'Mr. Pastorious' is worth it on its own.

But, in the end, if you're only going to get one 80's Miles album, get Aura. It's excellent. And not in a recontextualized "excellent" way either. It's genuinely good and holds up with anything else in his catalogue. Really love that album.

To anyone really interested in the 70's and 80's era Miles, I highly recommend Paul Tingen's book on the subject.

I really dig this Miles quote, talking about about his awesome 70's period.

“I remember one time - it might have been a couple times - at the Fillmore East in 1970, I was opening for this sorry-ass cat named Steve Miller. Steve Miller didn't have his shit going for him, so I'm pissed because I got to open for this non-playing motherfucker just because he had one or two sorry-ass records out. So I would come late and he would have to go on first and then we got there we smoked the motherfucking place, everybody dug it.”

as weird as the pairing might seem today, i don't know if it was that far off -- i think steve miller band was kinda thought of as jazz rock and they almost signed to Impulse!

Hey Tyler could you recommend a good Miles documentary? I have seen the Channel 4 one and its not bad but there must be a better one out there.

we want miles is like the funkiest miles record, doesn't sound dated at all, wtf are you people on about

xp you know i've only seen that Miles Davis Story doc. Which is ok, but not amazing. Seems like he deserves a really in-depth, multi-part series, doesn't it?

The Miles Electric DVD is the closest I've seen to a definitive Miles bio, and it only covers a few years (as if you couldn't have guessed from the title). Some interesting interviews with Hancock, Joni Mitchell, Mtume, and, you should pardon the expression, Stanley Crouch. Also includes his full 1970 Isle of Wight set which is as reliably inspired as any of his shows from that period.

Yeah, have seen that. Carlos Santana rhapsodizing over jazz doods is always entertaining.

yeah that one is good. love the bit where herbie does a little electric piano "impression" of miles.

i've said it many times, but Live Around the World is a fantastic gateway to the '80s stuff. much looser and less dated-sounding than the studio records, great bands.

I've heard a number of people say that about LAtW...I'll definitely check it out. Wasn't Al Foster still in the band for part of that?

it's almost all ricky wellman (who is great), but maybe al foster is on a track or two?

love the bit where herbie does a little electric piano "impression" of miles.

^^^best moment of the doc. love Herbie so much.

feel like i never really listened properly to "Go Ahead John" before. what the fuck is he doing to that guitar? is it phasing? this is properly heavy shit.

I can never recommend the Complete Bitches Brew Sessions enough.

I like Kilimanjaro and Get Up With It a lot.

I always find it unusual that one of Miles' main side-men was some bloke from Doncaster. What he does with a guitar and wah-wah pedal on Go Ahead John is extraordinary, pure mind blowing type shit. It is better than anything from the Jack Johnson sessions or indeed the album. It was my number 1 track in William C's Miles poll.

he joined Tony Williams's Lifetime first, so I assume that was how he was introduced to Miles?

dave holland = some bloke from wolverhampton!

xpost to Hurting - yep, just recently read an old 'Hello/Goodbye' feature in Mojo where McLaughlin talks abt joining Miles' group from Lifetime, and then leaving Miles to form Mahavishnu Orch. Unsurprisingly, according to John McG, T. Williams was not too 'chuffed' abt having his old boss steal his guitar player away from him.

lol, I have no idea whether "not too chuffed" = not too upset or not too pleased.

lol, not too pleased!

dave holland = some bloke from wolverhampton!

Fucking hell I always thought he was American!

Holland definitely has one of the most interesting discographies of Miles' sidemen, particularly of the electric period (Spontaneous Music Ensemble, Dave Holland Quartet, duo with Derek Bailey, etc.)

As is soda pop

lol, I have no idea whether "not too chuffed" = not too upset or not too pleased.

I'm listening to Go Ahead John again now. This thing blew my mind when I discovered it in college back in '94 or so.

Dur, no idea how "this is soda pop" made it in there. Late posting does me in.

Holland definitely has one of the most interesting discographies of Miles' sidemen, particularly of the electric period (Spontaneous Music Ensemble, Dave Holland Quartet, duo with Derek Bailey, etc.)

On one of the TV docs abt MD, Holland tells a great story about how, just after joining the Davis group, he played Miles an SME alb, and Miles' only response was, "Yeah, our group isn't going to sound like THAT"

'Conference of the Birds' is easily one of my all-time fave jazz albs - Sam Rivers AND Anthony Braxton, doesn't get better than that. And yeah, it's a goddamm crime that that Holland/Bailey duo rec has never been reissued.

On one of the TV docs abt MD, Holland tells a great story about how, just after joining the Davis group, he played Miles an SME alb, and Miles' only response was, "Yeah, our group isn't going to sound like THAT"

And yet, he'd let the rest of the band go pretty much as wild as they wanted to when he was offstage between solos.

My car was broken into last week and I had The Complete On The Corner Session in the glovebox and they took my box of silver change and left it behind. Shoulda taken the miles.

stealin one thing and leavin another

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbuHfoBAhas&list=PLCBD9E88B0D4226B2&index=81

The recently deceased from cancer Ricky Wellman on the drums with Miles. Wellman had been a DC go-go drummer with Chuck Brown in the late 70s into the 80s and for awhile with EU. Miles loved his playing on Chuck's "Go-go Swing" and hired him

Wow, had no idea Miles was still playing material from Jack Johnson in the 80s!

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/artsdesk/music/2013/12/02/remembering-the-great-d-c-drummer-ricky-sugarfoot-wellman/

Wellman drummed for Miles from 87 until Miles' death in 91.

Erin Davis says,

[My father] always had a real strong connection to all his drummers. Whoever was in that drum chair was always the anchor for what he was trying to do. He and Ricky had a very special relationship for a long time. They really worked well together and they really enjoyed playing with each other. He really loved Ricky.

Just got the advance CDs for the next volume in the Bootleg Series - Miles at the Fillmore - in today's mail. It's a four-disc set containing the complete sets from June 17-20, 1970 that were edited down into the four sides of At Fillmore under the titles "Wednesday Miles," "Thursday Miles," "Friday Miles," "Saturday Miles." At this point I think 1970 might be the most exhaustively documented year of Miles' professional life - there's this set, Black Beauty from April, all the various studio sessions in The Complete Jack Johnson Sessions box, the six-CD The Cellar Door Sessions 1970 box, the At the Fillmore East March 7, 1970 2CD set, Bitches Brew Live from a year or two ago...

And yet, this is the only one with both Chick and Keith, IIRC...

How's this banded, is it as separate tracks for each song or whatever? the original set that it expands on just went by sides as far as I remember, one for each night of the performance. & Teo Macero had severely edited performances so they fit into 20 minute vinyl sides.

I hope outside of this they continue to put out 3cd plus dvd sets in the series. Have been hoping for at least one 1973 video to be officially released, outside of the MOntreux one at least. & wish that would be released separately. I'm not that into him in the 80s which is what the rest of the MOntreux dvd set is I think.

How's this banded, is it as separate tracks for each song or whatever?

Yeah, each CD is a full set, with track divisions.

Hey, can any of you Miles heads tell me what the deal is with Electric Shout? It's not well-documented online at all, and certainly not from 1970, as is listed several places. I really dug (most of) this at work today.

http://www.mclub.com.ua/vcat.phtml?action=vs&album=13675

It looks like some kind of bootleg compilation of stuff ranging from 1968-69 up to maybe 1982.

Yeah I gathered that. I liked this version of "Jack Johnson." Weird live mix with congas way up front and guitarist in back. Trying to figure out what era this might be.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A60UDqt3kuU&list=PL8oYrR4DgBHzQUH6Lld_4F5LuQliKvuq8

Wasn't sure where to mention this but Cheadle's Miles movie is done:
http://www.factmag.com/2015/07/22/don-cheadles-miles-davis-biopic-to-close-the-new-york-film-festival/

Trying to keep expectations in check, but would really like this to be good.

I could imagine some terrible acting with someone trying to emulate the famous rasp.

Don Cheadle has as good a chance of pulling it off as any other actor I can think of

Anyone heard this yet btw?

www.amazon.com/Miles-Davis-At-Newport-1955-1975/dp/B00WNII7YS/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1437661465&sr=8-1&keywords=miles+at+newport

This series is always at least pretty good, and though I already have the early stuff here, the early 70s stuff looks very enticing.

Trying to keep expectations in check, but would really like this to be good.

― five six and (man alive), Wednesday, July 22, 2015 5:37 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yea def

is there a trailer for the film?

The Newport set is interesting, the highlight yeah is Berlin 11/1/73, which I already had a bootleg of. The sound is still oversaturated but that just adds to the intensity. Still digesting the whole box though.

No footage from the film that I've seen, just some on-set pics
http://blogs.indiewire.com/shadowandact/on-set-photos-from-don-cheadles-miles-ahead-now-filming-in-cincinnati-after-successful-crowdfunding-campaign-20140721

The 1971 and 1973 material is the best of that Newport set, though the 1966/67 sets by the acoustic quintet are also pretty hot, and worth having because they fill in some of that band's middle era - all previous live recordings either came from the beginning (1965) or the end (late '67) of the group's life. So you got them still in exploding-standards mode, or going wild. Here, they're somewhere in between, and it's fascinating to hear the differences.

I wanted a whole set of the 1971 band, which only existed for a single European tour in the fall of that year. Oh, well.

yeah, 71 + 73 are unbelievably good -- 71 seems like Jarrett's peak w/ Miles. Crazy that he just stopped playing electric keys after that! dude was amazing.
66-67 sets are great too, holy crap what a band.

I was just wondering if the song Willie had an actual Willie Nelson song as its influence or if it was just more general. I have heard that it had some source in Miles listening to him in the late 60s/early 70s.

Miles loved Willie's vocal phrasing.

They had the same road manager for a while (Mark Rothbaum).

since i have spent such little time w/ 80s miles i appreciated this rundown in p4k: http://pitchfork.com/thepitch/1078-a-guide-to-1980s-miles-davis/

the live in tokyo 1981 "my man's gone now" posted there is fantastic

It's a shame he apparently only felt like dealing with the Columbia albums. The Warner material is frequently stronger (I'm a big fan of Tutu and like Siesta a lot, too).

good to know, i haven't listened to either tutu or siesta

intrigued by the aura clip in there too

To me, Aura is easily the best thing he did in his comeback.

the citation of the vocal track on The Man With the Horn makes me wonder if he did enough of those to warrant a poll. Can think of at least two other instances (Birth of the Cool and Sorcerer) where there was a shitty, inexplicable track w a vocal tacked onto an album. are there others? why did Miles do this?

nothing like you has ever been seen before
nothing like you existed in days of yore

(has my vote)

why did Miles do this?

He was relatively adrift in 1962, which is part of why he did those songs with "that silly-ass singer, Bob Dorough," to fill out Quiet Nights. Why one of the songs from those sessions is on Sorcerer is a complete mystery. "Nothing Like You" was five years old at that point, and only two minutes long. A 38-minute Sorcerer without "Nothing Like You" would've been preferable.

Dunno the "why" about Birth of the Cool, other than that Kenny Hagood was in Dizzy's orchestra, and also sang on records by Bird and Monk.

Don't forget to include the rap tracks from Doo-Bop...

(whoops, none of the Dorough tracks appear on Quiet Nights)

Donno if it's true, but I've read that he blamed Gil for Quiet Nights belated release, belated enough to miss the commercial peak of the bossa nova-etc. trend. Also he thought Gil made it too bland, but I thought it was pretty good of its kind---good enough to associate with the previous Miles-Gil collabs, if def the mildest-mannered,at least in the Clark Kent sense (although I was then associating with this girl who had me listening to all this Getz/Gilberto stuff, so that may have made me too tolerant of QN). Which was the end of their official association, although eventually Gil was said to have contributed uncredited elements (for instance, "some patches," Miles said, re early switchboard-type synthesizer arrangements). Also, they resumed their friendship, and soon after Miles died, Gil said he had recently called and said he was finally ready to do their adaptation of Aida.
Um, anyway, Aura's orchestrations, provided by Palle Mikkelborg, seem like homage to pre-electric Gil, only more pastel---whole thing's pretty good though, even got McLaughlin in there, although not like he was on some of Miles' wildest late 60s/early 70s outings.
I like just about all of Miles' 80s albums---The Man With The Horn could be so smoove, uh-oh---except he also had pre-tasteful Mike Stern showing up periodically with these greasy mullet licks, so it was a Miles experience after all. And most of the others were better, like Star People was his kind of bluesy, You're Under Arrest and yeah xpostSiesta and Tutu, and the live We Want Miles with Al Foster kicking it out.

Also, they resumed their friendship, and soon after Miles died, Gil said he had recently called and said he was finally ready to do their adaptation of Aida.

Interesting, considering Gil died several years before Miles did.

Even *more* interesting, I say! (Gil really was quoted on that at some point)

ctrl+f "Live Around the World". I know it came out in the '90s, but contains late '80s recordings that are better than the studio versions (although it's been a long time since I've heard any of that stuff).

Oops again, it was Tosca (although he did record a track titled "Aida"), and he *and* Gil blamed Columbia and Teo in particular for releasing QN, according to this:
https://books.google.com/books?id=H5r-mzXMJfEC&pg=PA186&lpg=PA186&dq=Miles+Davis+Gil+Evans+Tosca&source=bl&ots=QpEoGQ4JUm&sig=9W-NPppnIG-wSlPpAkhz1MSbEaw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwid7M7wh-zLAhUB6CYKHaQaAigQ6AEIKjAF#v=onepage&q=Miles%20Davis%20Gil%20Evans%20Tosca&f=false

Also mentioned in Ian Carr's Miles bio:
https://books.google.com/books?id=bE_JBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA488&lpg=PA488&dq=Miles+Davis+Gil+Evans+Tosca&source=bl&ots=b8MObg1_Cm&sig=c0ppP_IZLJagRPow3ahokac0O3w&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiYu6KxiezLAhXFNiYKHYQUC38Q6AEISTAK#v=onepage&q=Miles%20Davis%20Gil%20Evans%20Tosca&f=false

And Gary Giddens' Visions of Jazz
https://books.google.com/books?id=MH0btmTBccsC&pg=PA355&lpg=PA355&dq=Miles+Davis+Gil+Evans+Tosca&source=bl&ots=A-LmjGE1FJ&sig=TlYLL0MbEMEUST2ffIstRD0XYCk&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiYu6KxiezLAhXFNiYKHYQUC38Q6AEITDAL#v=onepage&q=Miles%20Davis%20Gil%20Evans%20Tosca&f=false

And more irritably by Miles in various interview quotes.

and he *and* Gil blamed Columbia and Teo in particular for releasing QN, according to this:

Yeah, Miles refused to work with Macero for a time. It didn't last long, though, and Teo was back for Miles Smiles.

xpost, aren't there a couple live collections with almost the same title? I have the 2-LP Heard 'Round The World, an '83 reissue of Live In Tokyo, with Sam Rivers, and Live In Berlin, with Wayne Shorter---two great statesmen of space:
https://www.discogs.com/Miles-Davis-Heard-Round-The-World/release/1384693

I think so, I mean this one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Live_Around_the_World_(Miles_Davis_album)

so Manohla Dhargis likes this new Don Cheadle/Miles biopic...? (I couldn't find the other thread where we discussed the trailer). I'm deeply skeptical to say the least.

I finally picked up a physical copy of Big Fun this weekend and that record should rate much, much higher in MD's discography.
It's wall to wall fantastic. I know that everything on it has since been reissued but for being a comp it's remarkably coherent.

I love Big Fun. Considering it was mostly recorded during the Bitches Brew sessions, it's a lot quieter and reserved. Also love Dave Holland's playing across the board on that stuff.

Great Expectations/Orange Lady is magnificent, just a shimmering jewel of a cut. Ife is like the mellow side of OTC, and Go Ahead John may be Macero's most out-there moment ever

I've been looking for "Big Fun" on CD but haven't come across it in the wild. I may just order it on Discogs.

To me, this would be the better buy.

agreed, so good

Those "Complete ________ Sessions" on Columbia / Legacy are so friggin' good across the board, but the Bitches Brew set is the one I've gone back to most frequently over the years. The In A Silent Way box is a very close second.

Recollections is 'the one' for me on the Big Fun set. But Go Ahead is something else again. De Johnette (and Macero's treatment of him) is insane.

I'm listening to the LP so I've not heard Recollections. I'll have to give it a listen.

To me, this would be the better buy.

― outside, you're never alone. (Austin), Tuesday, September 4, 2018 11:35 AM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

agreed, so good

― sleeve, Tuesday, September 4, 2018 11:39 AM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i was totally wondering about whether to buy this this weekend.. so thanks!!

(bb sessions box)

Especially at the price range it's currently going for on Discogs, it's worth every penny.

Today being the anniversary of Davis's birth, I wrote about AURA, a 1989 album that's never really clicked for me.

The next volume in the Bootleg Series has been announced; it's called That's What Happened 1982-85, and includes a disc of unreleased tracks from the Star People sessions, a disc of unreleased tracks from the You're Under Arrest sessions, and a live disc from 1983 (which is being released separately). I'm kinda excited. One of the previously unreleased 1985 tracks is a version of Tina Turner's "What's Love Got To Do With It":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-ZBl_rvmRE

https://www.discogs.com/release/24534968-Miles-Davis-The-Bootleg-Series-Vol-7-Thats-What-Happened-1982-1985

indeed.

A new remaster of Star People is the Vinyl Me Please "Classics" title for November.

I so wanted to like his eighties stuff...I love the attitude of going completely commercial and reconnecting with his audience, but I found it a chore.

I've always thought Star People was the weakest of the 80s albums, but maybe I need to revisit.

The Heat Warps blog has been posting a lot of great shows from, I think, the late 60s, and for sure on up to '75. In the 80s, I especially liked the fairly raw live We Want Miles[ and Aura, where he's with McLaughlin and The Danish Radio Big Band, feat. ace bassist Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen: it's composed and arranged by Palle Mikkelborg, in the manner of Gil Evans, like if Miles and Gil got back together to make a *tasteful* update of their previous collabs, with a bit of electrification---real good for what it is.

Decoy is a good Miles 80s album too, with John Scofield.

listen to the live stuff!!!!

Live 80s Miles > studio 80s Miles pretty much across the board, except that I love Tutu.

Tutu and Amandla are both classics

Here’s one of the most insane mid 80s miles live sets

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIWgJJzG_aY

I love 80s miles. The incorporation of 80s production techniques feel especially fresh to me these days

My go-to 80s Miles track is "Fat Time"

i was typing really fast earlier but reading the pfork review of the new set inspired me to elaborate: the '80s miles studio recordings are for the most part great, tutu and amandla are my faves but star people which this set explores is maybe the closest his '80s studio work got to the (always revelatory) live work. but, like, even the man with the horn is dope af, people listen to it with their ears clouded by preexisting notions of him falling off in the '80s but it sounds like a direct follow-up to get up with it if you're hearing it right

decoy, star people, and you're under arrest see him folding in '80s production techniques and contemporaneous covers but they just sound, idk, amazing, unlike any other music, alive, emotional, sleek, mechanical, and generally always the funkiest thing you've ever heard. deej otm essentially

i also think the portrayal of him "going commercial" in the '80s ignores that his '70s fusion work was also an attempt to "go commercial" and connect to the youth but the translation came out beguilingly weird. same thing largely happened here, imo

This was posted on the jazz thread, but it's a fantastic interview with Pete Cosey, includes some bits on planned bands/records that failed to come together between 75 - 80. Also that Zigaboo Modeliste was supposed to join the band in the 70s.

Milford Graves was approached by Miles in the early '70s, too. Not sure how that would've gone -- if it would've been a typical Miles situation of, "You know that thing you do? Don't do it," or if he would've been in more of an Mtume role -- but either way, Milford turned Miles down.

Let me say that "Hopscotch" is fantastic.

i also think the portrayal of him "going commercial" in the '80s ignores that his '70s fusion work was also an attempt to "go commercial" and connect to the youth but the translation came out beguilingly weird. same thing largely happened here, imo

I agree a little, disagree a little, and/but in any case I wrote a whole book on electric Miles and it didn't stop at 1975, nor was it just about the music qua music — I talked about the Honda scooter commercial, the Miami Vice appearance, the way he started doing many, many more interviews in the 80s than he had before, and generally how he consciously attempted to become *a star* in 80s pop culture terms. And the music is definitely a big part of that, but not all of it; he wanted to be part of the pantheon. Look at the way he constantly praised Prince, in a way he never talked about Hendrix or James Brown or Sly in the 70s.

I could more readily picture a Graves/Coltrane album, though.

xp

Milford was a Latin percussionist before he became a jazz drummer; if Miles wanted him to do some Tito Puente shit, that could have been amazing.

The thought of Miles of approaching Graves is kinda of blowing my mind, just the two of them in the same room at the same time might have been too much haha

ooh have i missed the link for the cosey i/v?

new box set contains more instances of miles saying "teooooo" so it was worth releasing imo

Sorry, Cosey interview:
https://www.thelastmiles.com/interviews-pete-cosey/

ecollections is 'the one' for me on the Big Fun set. But Go Ahead is something else again. De Johnette (and Macero's treatment of him) is insane.

― The shard-borne beetle with his drowsy hums (Chinaski), Tuesday, September 4, 2018 2:13 PM (four years ago) bookmarkflaglink

I'm listening to the LP so I've not heard Recollections. I'll have to give it a listen.

― Scam jam, thank you ma’am (Sparkle Motion), Tuesday, September 4, 2018

the "obx ballad" suite is awesome, what the heck

i'm so happy

Speaking of this one, as Brad just did, I mentioned here in 2016:

I like just about all of Miles' 80s albums---The Man With The Horn could be so smoove, uh-oh---except he also had pre-tasteful Mike Stern showing up periodically with these greasy mullet licks, so it was a Miles experience after all.

Not just quotes, Miles also plays new stuff on the album.

unperson otm- he definitely *seemed* more open to pimping himself after coming out of retirement. it bugged me for a long time, but it occurs later in my own life: if he could appear on miami vice and then talk mountains of shit in interviews -just in the name of being MILES- why tf shouldn't he have?

also not trying to argue with brad, but the big difference about 70s vs 80s miles is that he was straight up playing others folks (very popular) music in the 80s. same shit he did in the bebop days, but the tech was just totally different, obviously. that just didn't happen in the late 60s/70s. he played music "inspired by" the pop stuff he liked but, well, on the corner was never gonna sound like sly or james brown. tho i do agree we want miles is a seriously undervalued recording - especially if you like that fried acid funk he was doing just before calling it quits.

new archive set is really fascinating. really glad to have the bootleg series back. hopefully this isn't the last one.

i mean i'm not trying to flatten the shift but pop music and the notion of engaging with it in the '70s vs the '80s are v different propositions to begin with. anyway my point mostly is that his commercial ambition didn't necessarily result in commercial music in either decade, e.g. how "human nature" and "time after time" get pretty exploded live, and i mostly just want to encourage people to listen to this stuff with open ears bc you will hear the same miles from the previous decades just pushing mercilessly forward. fuck if tutu and amandla sound like anything else really, even though they're critically thought of as occupying the same space as smooth jazz

i mostly just want to encourage people to listen to this stuff with open ears bc you will hear the same miles from the previous decades just pushing mercilessly forward

This I agree with 1000%. I wish the individual concerts from the giant 20CD Complete Miles At Montreux box were broken out and released separately, because all those different bands (1984, 1986, 1988, 1989) absolutely destroyed live.

excellent points all around- and i have to admit that i was one of those people who used to be very snobby re:80s miles. but you're both right: he always used his bands to build off of and that's really on display in the 80s. just because the tech changed didn't mean his chops did.

Thanks Jordan!

also not trying to argue with brad, but the big difference about 70s vs 80s miles is that he was straight up playing others folks (very popular) music in the 80s. same shit he did in the bebop days, but the tech was just totally different, obviously. that just didn't happen in the late 60s/70s. he played music "inspired by" the pop stuff he liked but, well, on the corner was never gonna sound like sly or james brown. tho i do agree we want miles is a seriously undervalued recording - especially if you like that fried acid funk he was doing just before calling it quits.

new archive set is really fascinating. really glad to have the bootleg series back. hopefully this isn't the last one.

― ミ💙🅟 🅛 🅤 🅡 🅜 🅑💙彡 (Austin), Tuesday, September 20, 2022 11:44 AM (five hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

the way he 'tried to' become a star in the 80s (was still a star...) is actually much closer to jazz's formative essence than the stuff in the 70s where he's essentially fitting into rockist formatting (70s and 90s are alike in this way, and it makes sense that his 80s music became so ignored in the 90s when ppl got very hardcore real instruments-ish). what is a song like 'time after time' 'human nature' 'whats love got to do with it' but the contemporary version of a jazz standard?

lately been really into the 1987-1988 era miles stuff when he was working with Ricky Wellman on drums. You literally have the drummer who essentially innovated Go-Go with Chuck Brown playing behind Miles Davis for like two three years?? its insane stuff, that ppl pretended working w one of the most innovative percussionists -- innovative in an all-around musical genre sense -- was 'going pop' is bonkers, no one would interpret a similar maneuver that way today

good revive, I gotta check some of this stuff out. another vote for the greatness of We Want Miles!

Also while I do appreciate this stuff on a surface textural level, for feeling like a lost sonic template that feels fresh because of how difficult it is to find today, the amazing thing is that it isn't disposable 'on trend' either...like there's real meat to it, there's prismatic depths to what's being created here, even as its begun to feel prophetic for incorporating certain sonic accents that are swinging around to Cool again, it's never one-dimensionally That (well or rarely...)

Also random but Prince evidently was a huge fan of "You're Under Arrest," which I do love but that era feels a little blunt-instrument compared to TuTu and Amanda for me

lately been really into the 1987-1988 era miles stuff when he was working with Ricky Wellman on drums. You literally have the drummer who essentially innovated Go-Go with Chuck Brown playing behind Miles Davis for like two three years?? its insane stuff, that ppl pretended working w one of the most innovative percussionists -- innovative in an all-around musical genre sense -- was 'going pop' is bonkers, no one would interpret a similar maneuver that way today

Yeah, "Big Time" from Amandla (with Wellman on drums, and Jean-Paul Bourelly on guitar) is fantastic.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C85mwkuOCy0

ever since i relented about a decade ago, i've always considered amandla top tier later miles. that stuff is super rad. i thought for sure it would see a revival with the vaporwave stuff; maybe it did, i'm not hip enough to be in the know about such things. really hope there's a bootleg series installment to coincide with it.

also xpost back to unperson re:the big montreux box- always waited for them to piece that out, but alas no.

There was also a DVD version, because all those sets were filmed, too! I never did pick that up and kinda wish I had.

stuff in the 70s where he's essentially fitting into rockist formatting fuck this: he and Macero were finding their own formats, with musicians from various traditions, subgenres, individualized specialties pulled into and changed by his playing and instructions and Macero's edits. More audacious than his and Marcus Miller's partnership, but "rockist" doesn't say it.

Wanna thank this thread revive, been blasting the new box set all afternoon. Love Tutu and Aura, the latter among the most intrusive quietly textured music I own.

stuff in the 70s where he's essentially fitting into rockist formatting fuck this: he and Macero were finding their own formats, with musicians from various traditions, subgenres, individualized specialties pulled into and changed by his playing and instructions and Macero's edits. More audacious than his and Marcus Miller's partnership, but "rockist" doesn't say it.

― dow, Tuesday, 20 September 2022 23:25 (yesterday) link

Lol relax. I’m talking about marketing — starting with bitches brew it was clear his label was banking on hippies. That’s not a slight of the music, but album oriented auteur w psychedelic packaging who plays rock festivals is undeniably a (smart) embrace of rockist angle vs what he did in the 80s

yeah i wz also gnna come and and ask "er what mean rockist here"? -- a word not used at all until the 80s and not (at first) usually deployed in ways that easily translate D-40's claim

but per his translation above i now largely agree it lol: the matrix the work was being poured into is primarily aimed at this new LP-buying market which CBS etc didn't really understand yet (it didn't understand itself yet)

stockhausen and terry riley were getting similar treatment: it's a function of evolving format and technology far more than it's a function of sound or artistic intention -- and for a few years (67-72ish?) "rock" was an exorbitantly expansive category apparently gobbling up all the other genres, with omni-embrace as its utopian (but also threatening) core

Yeah---in a way it goes back to the "songster," the travelling human jukebox, who better be ready to play whatever, in addition to his possibly famous specialty, like Robert Johnson supposedly had his covers ready to go, and if you were in the house band, as Buck Owens talked about---then The Hawks experience travelling North America with Ronnie Hawkins, hearing and playing all sorts of things, going to being The Band (with and without the similarly inclined Dylan), putting elements of different subgenres etc. in the same originals, or juxtaposing of originals; the Beatles also drawing on their club band experience, Doug Sahm and Ornette allegedly sometimes with several recombinan combos on the same stage, and certainly Elvis had that on tour in his last decade (see Elvis On Tour, also Dylan when I saw him in the late 70s, between Rolling Thunder per se and his Jesus flock, and Sun Ra with Arkestra, even Woody Herman's Herd, when I saw him and them in the early 70s. Miles said there was no point in judging what he was doing as jazz, because jazz was just one of the things he was drawing on, though I heard it as something like freeing the spirit of jazz from the letter (incl. letter of "free jazz," as that became another codified subetc.) The freedom *principle* of jazz, or whatever it was and is.
Also, on the grassroots side, this is from the 50s:

Some Saturday nights there were barn dances, way out in Elgin or Sonoita. In barns. Everybody from miles and miles would go, old people, young people, babies, dogs. Guests from dude ranches. All of the women brought things to eat. Fried chicken and potato salad, cakes and pies and punch. The men would go out in bunches and hang around their pickups, drinking. Some women too, my mother always did. High school kids got drunk and threw up, got caught necking. Old ladies danced with each other and children. Everybody danced.
Two-step mostly, but some slow dances and jitterbug. Some square dances and Mexican dances like La Varsoviana. In English it's "Put your little foot, put your little foot right there," and you skip and whirl around. They played everything from "Night and Day" to "Detour, There's a Muddy Road Ahead," "Jalisco no te Rajas" to "Do the Hucklebuck." Different bands every night but the same kind of mix.
Where did these raging wonderful musicians come from? Pachuco horns and guitar players, big-hatted country guitarists, bebop drummers, piano-players that looked like Fred Astaire. The closest I ever heard anything come close to those little bands was at the Five Spot in the late fifties. Ornette Coleman's "Ramblin'." Everybody raving how new and far-out he was. Sounded Tex-Mex to me, like a good Sonoita hoedown.

------Lucia Berlin, "Homing"

*recombinant* combos, like sometimes the drummer from one and sax player from another, just to keep it fresh, and musos on their toes. Arthur Russell might do this too, though maybe more from night to night, at the Kitchen, say.

But yeah also omni-embrace as its utopian (but also threatening) core sometimes crushed together in the context of no context, or some possibly threatening context---like the reaction (maybe now more than ever) that some listeners had and have to My Life In The Bush of Ghosts. Or the cosmic showmanship side of some jazz from the 60s-70s on (not a prob for me, if I happen to like the artist, but otherwise yeah can get too slick, while talking the talk)

Nice work quoting Lucia Berlin.

Sorry, Cosey interview:
https://www.thelastmiles.com/interviews-pete-cosey🕸/

In a previous interview, Cosey mentioned. by the by, that he used to have a recorder going onstage with Miles, kept the results in a box under his bed, sometimes kicked back and listened. Maybe some of those have gotten around, to the xpost Heat Warps blog, for inst?

There are absolutely some recordings on The Heat Warps — from the South American tour of 1973-74 IIRC — that were recorded by someone onstage; Dave Liebman, I think. They sound amazing. There's one where you can actually hear Miles' wah-wah pedal creaking when he steps on it.

I will play the Agharta version of "Maiysha" all morning.

Hell yeah. I like how that version goes back and forth between the lounge and funk sections where the studio version is just part A -> part B

The electric piano going through the wah wah pedal on Miles at the Fillmore often makes sounds that remind me of PAC Man when he is chomping up dots. It is kinda uncanny.

Listening to 'Double Image: Rare Miles from the Complete Bitches Brew Sessions' after it came up on someone's 50 album list and it's fantastic. Tbh I'm enjoying this more than Bitches Brew, it's more focused and spacious (and Billy Cobham rips).

yeah that’s a really great collection, I am all about random configurations of fusion miles

gonna put that on right now!

I also much prefer it to Bitches Brew itself

Four tracks from this were bonuses on the CD release of Big Fun, and they're probably as good as the original LP.

I disagree with all of this. Most of these tunes feature the band wandering around trying to catch a spark. Which is fine because, well, they’re the best musicians in the world, but none of the tracks is better than what was officially released around this time. Also, Yaphet sounds pretty clearly like a run at Great Expectations.

Chatter of Miles getting pissy with Teo in the studio tho is A+.

I’m still a little sad we never got an actual Complete Bitches Brew Sessions box with dry runs and whatnot. No I don’t listen to my Jack Johnson or IASW boxes all that frequently but the process of these sessions is def. almost as interesting as the results. And now Belden is dead. Oh well.

does that material exist for Bitches Brew? if so, why did it not get included in the complete sessions box?

My favorite of these compilations is Champions, which is all the tracks named after boxers from the Complete Jack Johnson Sessions box (except for "Archie Moore," for some reason). Put together, they're a seriously nasty electric blues album:

https://tidal.com/browse/album/233171325

This year's "Turnaround" had 4 tracks from the "Complete On The Corner Sessions" box. I had already cherry picked that stuff and came up with an excellent companion disc:
One And One (Unedited Master) - a completely different track!
Jabali (on "Turnaround")
The Hen (on "Turnaround")
Peace
Mr. Foster
Hip-Skip
What They Do

does that material exist for Bitches Brew?

I'm pretty sure I read that it no longer exists.

I've been on a Masabumi Kikuchi kick lately and was listening to Wishes by his Kochi one-off this morning. Not many reviews of it out there, but I saw one on Jazzwise that had this brief note:

Japanese pianist Masabumi Kikuchi recorded with Miles in 1978 (unissued), two years after he convened this stellar band, including several Miles alumni, to work through his own formulation of that sound.

I never knew that, does anyone know about that unreleased session?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-xpGTuR75s