Here at Cosmic Jazz we want to get in early and celebrate two iconic jazz centenaries over coming months. We’re going to feature the music of Miles Davis and John Coltrane – both born in 1926 – in several special shows. This first one is on the legendary Miles Davis – but be prepared for some surprises in our music choices.
- Miles Davis – Rubberband of Life (feat. Ledisi) from Rubberband
Rubberband was recorded in 1985 but not released until 2019. As such, it qualifies as ‘lost album’ – with all the critical uncertainty that this status brings. Of course, it’s not a great Miles album – that would have been too much to expect. But there are many redeeming features – not least the vocals of Ledisi on this version of the title track. It’s a highlight of this patchy album, recorded when Miles had left Columbia Records and was heading to Warner Bros., and it’s very much a record of it’s time – there’s lots of synths and slap bass but there’s still the unmistakeable Miles tone liberally sprinkled across the record (and note that – uniquely on CJ – throughout this piece we will be referring to the trumpeter by his first name alone).
2. Miles Davis – Spanish Key (single) from The Complete Bitches Brew
In 1970, Miles was going full on to change the course of jazz. He tested the waters with the sublime In a Silent Way (1969) but went all out with Bitches Brew the following year. There’s so much to say about this record – and Neil has done that in his initial Cosmic Jazz profile. It’s worth recapping a little of that right here: In 1973 I went for an interview in Oxford. I had some time to spare while waiting for a train and so I dropped into a local record store. Flicking through the jazz racks, I saw this sleeve. Bitches Brew by Miles Davis. I teased the sleeve out of its plastic wallet. A gatefold. Inside was an essay by Ralph J Gleason and a great colour shot of Miles. Back to the front cover. Right at the top it said ‘Direction in Music by Miles Davis.’ And it was a double. That cover – by Mati Klarwein – was clearly by the same artist as had provided the inspired cover for Santana’s Abraxas album, also released in 1970. Inside the gatefold was a list of the performers – Wayne Shorter on soprano sax (my favourite sound at the time), Joe Zawinul on electric piano, Bennie Maupin on bass clarinet, Billy Cobham on drums – and another photo of Miles. I had no idea what it would sound like – but I knew it would be my sound. Neil noted that he now knows each twist and turn on every track – and he still does! He could have chosen any of the tracks on this Teo Macero-produced album but went for the single version of Spanish Key which can be found on the Complete Bitches Brew box set from 1998.
3. Miles Davis – Florence sur Les Champs Elysées from Ascenseur Pour L’Echafaud
This celebrated soundtrack to Louis Malle’s film (1958) was improvised by Miles while watching a playback of the film in the studio. Miles was playing the Club Saint-Germain in Paris in November 1957 and was introduced to Malle by Juliette Greco (with whom Miles had previously had an affair). Later he was invited to a private screening of Ascenseur Pour L’Echafaud (Lift To The Scaffold) before taking his group to the studio and improvising to a projection of extracts from the film. The result was this perfect soundtrack recorded in just three hours. The band he used was the Barney Wilen Quartet: Wilen on tenor sax, Rene Urtreger on piano, Pierre Michelot on bass and American expat drummer and bebop pioneer Kenny Clarke. In his autobiography, Miles claims he chose the studio for its gloomy, dark ambience and that’s translated into this stunning music. Just check out this extract from the film with star Jeanne Moreau walking the Paris streets.
4. Miles Davis – Walkin’ from The Complete Live at the Plugged Nickel
Very recently re-released, The Complete Live at the Plugged Nickel is a recording masterpiece. Recorded over two nights in Chicago in 1965, this legendary run captures Miles Davis and his Second Great Quintet redefining what live jazz could be. With Wayne Shorter, Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter and Tony Williams in peak form, the music feels both volatile and telepathic with standards like Stella by Starlight and All of You pulled apart and rebuilt mid-flight. The interplay is astonishing – Miles’ clipped phrases sparring Shorter’s angular tenor sax, all held together by young Tony Williams’ restless drumming, Hancock’s harmonic flights and Ron Carter’s solid basslines. This is the sound of a band simply testing the limits of improvised music and it should be essential listening for any jazz lover. These epic performances are again available on CD or vinyl – at a price, of course. Neil was lucky enough to get the Japanese SACD edition of this set, but don’t go looking for it on ebay unless you have very deep pockets. He’s even seen it advertised there at $6,470!
5. Miles Davis – Splashdown from The Complete In A Silent Way
Neil acknowledges that there are good reasons why this didn’t make the final cut on In A Silent Way, the album that first saw Miles breaking out of the classic Quintet structure and instead beginning to deploy a bigger cast of what would become the most important musicians in jazz. Splashdown is simply not good enough. But it is fascinating in these box sets to hear the evolution of what becomes some of the most influential music in the genre. By early 1969, Miles’ core working band had stabilised around Wayne Shorter now on soprano sax, Dave Holland on bass with Chick Corea on Fender Rhodes and Jack de Johnette on drums. For In a Silent Way, Miles added Tony Williams (again) and Herbie Hancock (again) and then included English guitarist John McLaughlin and Austrian keyboard player Joe Zawinul (who had been in Cannonball Adderley’s band). Significantly, this was the first jazz album to be extensively edited by producer Teo Macero whose techniques were informed by classical sonata form. The result was that the first and third sections of each of the two tracks on the album were the same. Check out this alternative take on the stunning It’s About That Time from the Complete In A Silent Way Sessions and look at what Rolling Stone critic Lester Bangs said about the album on its release: the kind of album that gives you faith in the future of music. It is not rock and roll, but it’s nothing stereotyped as jazz either. All at once, it owes almost as much to the techniques developed by rock improvisors in the last four years as to Davis’ jazz background. It is part of a transcendental new music which flushes categories away and, while using musical devices from all styles and cultures, is defined mainly by its deep emotion and unaffected originality. We concur!
6. Miles Davis – It Never Entered My Mind from Workin’ with the Miles Davis Quintet
Now, this is music to make you cry – indeed Neil knows people who do when they listen to this early example of work by the First Great Quintet as they were called – Miles on trumpet, John Coltrane on tenor sax, Red Garland on piano, Paul Chambers on bass and Philly Joe Jones on drums. As his star rose in 1955, Miles had formed his new quintet and – in order to fulfil contractual obligations – he went into the studio in 1956, recording in just two sessions enough material for four albums. These were subsequently titled Workin’, Cookin’, Relaxin’ and Steamin’. From Workin’, It Never Entered My Mind was a Rogers and Hart tune recorded by – among others – Ella Fitzgerald and Frank Sinatra but this version is something special. The Miles trumpet solo is infinitely memorable and Red Garland’s piano is a magical addition. One to treasure.
7. Miles Davis – Duran (take 6) from The Complete Jack Johnson
Another selection from one of the Columbia boxes, this track comes from the Complete Jack Johnson set, collected in 2003. Named for Panamanian boxer Roberto Durán, this track is also one that didn’t make the final cut on the Jack Johnson album (1971) – but it is a terrific piece, driven by Jack De Johnette’s rock-powered drumming and Steve Grossman’s stunning soprano sax. The album was conceived by Davis to accompany a documentary about Johnson, the first black heavyweight champion and was clearly inspired by the political and racial subtext of Johnson’s story. The musicians on the two day session also included John McLaughlin and Sonny Sharrock on guitars, Herbie Hancock and Chick Corea on keyboards with new electric bass player Michael Henderson setting an irresistible groove.
8. Shirley Horn – You Won’t Forget Me from from You Won’t Forget Me
We end this show with a wonderful tune from Miles’ favourite singer, Shirley Horn. This would be the final guest appearance on record from Miles – just a few months after recording this in 1991 he would be dead. But there’s no sense of loss of tone here – that unmistakable trumpet sound weaves around Horn’s vocal with the same mesmerising effect that we heard on It Never Entered My Mind. In a magazine interview Horn noted Well, I loved Miles so much. He got to be like a part of me. Of course, I knew about him many years before actually. I met him, but I was a married woman and I got a call. To this day, I don’t know how he got this phone number, but I was with my mother-in-law and my husband down in Virginia having breakfast and this party said, “This is Miles Davis. I want you to come to New York. There is some people, I think, you should get to know.” And I thought it was somebody, some friends playing a joke or something. So I thought about it and I thought that maybe I should go to New York. And she did… If you don’t know Shirley Horn’s unique vocal styling then Neil also recommends her later 1998 tribute to Miles which features a cover drawing by Miles of them both. It’s a fitting image to end this first Miles @ 100 show. There will be more.