June 2008

«19» Just received an e-mail from Don Was, the legendary producer (Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, Stones) and co-band leader of Was (Not Was):

"got the miles book....opened it and couldn't put it down!!! very well researched... thorough and fascinating! well done...thank you."

Cheers Don. Was has a fascinating web site with some great music on it. You can find it here... It's full of videos of artists he's worked with, shot in the studio. Great camerawork with focus on the musicians and the sound is pretty good too... beats everything on YouTube hands down. Click on the tab 'Watch Don Was' and check out in particular the vids with Sweat Pea Atkinson, Wayne Kramer, Guy Clark and the free jazz of saxophonist David McMurray.

More updates on the Miles movie. The first scenes for the documentary were shot early June, with the following people involved, Director: Chris Wilkinson; executive Producer Kerry David; producers: Chris Wilkinson and Bob Belden; director of photography Steven Poster; editor Tim Robin. Cast: Jimmy Heath, James Moody, Roy Haynes, Freddie Hubbard, Ron Carter. Subject: The Jazz Scene, life and times from pre-Early Miles to the sixties.

Someone alerted me to these pictures of Miles. Looks like they were taken some time in the fifties, and he's looking remarkably relaxed and healthy.

April 2008

«20» Some more details of the upcoming Miles Davis feature movie, which will by accompanied by a documentary. Both are financed by HBO/Picturehouse. Everyone should know by now that Don Cheadle (Crash, Ocean's Thirteen) is directing the feature film and will star as Miles Davis. Chris Wilkinson and Stephen Rivele ("Ali"/"Nixon") are writing the screenplay and are executive producing, and Vince Wilburn Jr. and Darryl Porter are producing. Shooting is due to start in May, 2008. With regards to the documentary, Chris Wilkinson is the director, and it will be co-produced by him and Bob Belden. Filming is about to begin. The release date of these goodies? Who knows.

Left the cover of the May issue of Rave magazine, featuring Louiz Banks, keyboardist and arranger, who is, next to Bob Belden, the central force behind the Miles From India album. Rave is an Indian music magazine that appears to have discovered jazz with the imminent release of Miles From India. Belden is Rave's new jazz editor and there's a headline that claims India: The Future of Jazz. It might be worth picking up this issue of Rave, if you can get it. Btw, more news about Miles From India soon...

«17» Teo Macero, the grand master studio magician who played an essential role in many of Miles' greatest recordings, including many of his electric efforts, left his physical form on February 19. In addition, Joe Zawinul died last September. I had the pleasure of knowing both of them, and they were great men indeed. Both were instrumental in the making of two of Miles' most influential albums, In A Silent Way and Bitches Brew. To commemmorate the duo, I've retrieved my 2001 article for Mojo magazine about the recordings of these two albums, featuring interviews with them, as well as with several others that were present. You can read this article here... Oh, when reading, bear in mind that this was written for a rock audience. The article assumes that readers are au fait with this bit of music history...

January 2008

«28» Too late to wish any of you MF's a Happy New Year, so here's me simply saying 'hi' and hoping that you're still occasionally checking in, because I have some good news for you. First of all, my prayers have been heard and an enthusiastic visitor to this site with software programming skills has contacted me and is now busy redesigning and programming this site. Some time later this year you'll be able to visit Miles Beyond MkII, the main difference being that many pages will be interactive, offering you the space to comment on and discuss what's on these pages! It'll prompt me to write some reviews, for instance of the Complete On The Corner Sessions, and you can add your own opinions, or dispute mine or anyone else's. I also intend to post more bootleg material, both AV and audio. All this should enliven this site no end!

Then, for those living in the US, the January-February issue of Jazziz magazine contains a feature article by me on the making of On The Corner. I may be biased, but will nevertheless assert that it makes worthwhile reading!

And finally, I just received a press release about the impending Miles From India release, which, as I've remarked below, is fantastic. I'll soon also post a full track and personnel listings and, with permission, a few snippets of music.

You can read the whole press release here......

December 2007

Aside from the seasonal well-wishes, the images above also serves to illustrate the two main reasons for the relative lack of updates on this site! I hope to be able to spend more time in the saddle next year. Anyway, have a good one, and, in keeping with the spirit of the season, you might want to click on the The Hunger Site and The Rainforest Site...

«04» A very amusing Complete On The Corner Sessions review on the Mapsadaisical blog site can be found here... Also entertaining, and we'll forgive the young critic some ignorant remarks (e.g. Miles calling people "motherfucker" had nothing to do with him being angry), is the piece in Stylus magazine here... Finally, the BBC says that everyone should have the OTC boxed set, and when they say it, it must be true... not? Read it here...

«03» Thanx for all your e-mails in recent weeks, mostly with reflections on The Complete On The Corner Sessions boxed set. Yes, a blog review of the boxed set, to which you can add your own impressions, is in the works, as is a blog review of Evolution of the Groove. Rather than apologise again for the delay with these efforts, perhaps this time it's better to tell you all to get a grip and that it is, admittedly at a stretch, possible to have a life without Miles Beyond updates!

In any case, here's a nice piece of news: I was sent a copy of the final masters of the Miles From India album, and... it's stunning. What could have been a Frankenstein-like juxtaposition of different cultures is, instead, a triumph. Former Miles sidemen Dave Liebman, Gary Bartz, Marcus Miller, John McLaughlin, Pete Cosey, Mike Stern, Adam Holzman, Robert Irving III, Chick Corea, Ron Carter, Benny Rietveld, Michael Henderson, Jimmy Cobb, Lenny White, Vince Wilburn, Jr., Ndugu and Badal Roy are all involved, as well as Wallace Rooney who sounds more like Miles around 1969 than ever before. Together with well over a dozen eminent Indian musicians they work their way through a collection of tracks from Kind Of Blue, In A Silent Way, Bitches Brew, and Big Fun, and the results are amazing. The album is planned for release in February on Times Square Records. Look out for it! I'll ask whether I can post a few snippets... Oh, and a small detail: Vince Wilburn and Adam Holzman play together on one of the tracks, which is cool as they until recently were not on speaking terms. Perhaps there's hope for Vince and yours truly after all! :)

On a sadder note, news has reached me that Tom Terrell, journalist and the writer of some of the liner notes for the Complete On The Corner Sessions has died of cancer. Tom's liner notes have come in for quite a lot of stick in some quarters, including from yours truly, because they were strong on impressionistic anecdotes and short on actual information and explanations. Given the mysterious and often perplexing nature of the music involved, the latter seemed more urgently called for. Whatever one's opinion on his notes, we wish those close to Tom strength and courage.

Then, not to leave you hanging in there with nothing, a few people have alerted me to reviews of the Complete On The Corner Sessions, in one case kindly agreeing with a comment that Miles Beyond, the book, should have been bundled with the boxed set. Who am I to argue with that?! :) Read the review here... In addition, Dave Segal alerted me to his review for Orange County Weekly, which you can read here..., while Greg Masters pointed to his very, very thorough review in All About Jazz, which you can read here...

Now, onto creating these blogs... It's hard to find time to do this, let alone spend the time involved learning about html coding, so if anyone who has experience in creating interactive web sites is willing to help me create such pages at the miles-beyond.com site, please contact me via... Ooops, this reminds me, the contact address for this site has changed! It's now speak@theurlofthissite. In other words, speak, the 'at' sign, and then miles-beyond.com.

October 2007

«26» Apologies, once again, for the lack of updates, due to the demands of my First Life: family, writing, playing music, the universe, and everything. Internet's Second Life has by consequence been rather neglected, this despite the fact that these are exciting times, with The Complete On The Corner Sessions seeing the light of day. Thanx for your various e-mails about the album and your book orders. It appears that the boxed set is finally easily available in the US, and the UK release will be this coming Monday.

To coincide with the UK release, The Guardian is publishing a story on the influence of On The Corner(see image to the left), written by yours truly . You can find the story here.... In addition, Jazziz magazine in the US will be publishing an entirely different story by me about On The Corner in their November issue, featuring new interviews with a number of the musicians. Meanwhile, Jazzwise magazine in the UK has published a story by my colleage George Cole, author of the book The Last Miles, and you can read an excerpt of it here...

Like many of you, I've also finally been able to lay my hands on the finished product of The Complete On The Corner Sessions, and, well, the embossed casing is great, and the booklet pretty cool too, with several great new photographs of Miles and his band in the 1970s. The only downsides of the finished product are that the essay by Tom Terrell is spread out so much that it's hard to read, I suppose Legacy felt that it had to fill the pages somehow to make the booklet look as substantial as that of previous boxed sets, and there's also an additional very short essay by Terrell that wasn't included in the pre-release promo pack. The brief essay places On The Corner in the context of Miles' musical development of 1969-1975, and is fine, though writing that OTC relegated Bitches Brew to "near-demo status" is just plain silly.

Yes, I do intend to start these blogs, that will allow you MF's to comment. Watch this space next week, when I'll post that promised page about Evolution of the Groove and there'll also be space to give your comments on The Complete On The Corner Sessions. So check back soon...

Finally, a pic from The Complete On The Corner Sessions era. It was first seen as part of the packaging of Dark Magus, which was recorded in March 1974 and featured a different band. This pic is from April 1973, when Cosey had just joined, and Smith and the two Indian musicians were still in the band. From left to right, Reggie Lucas, Lonnie Liston Smith, Dave Liebman, Pete Cosey, Miles Davis, Michael Henderson, Badal Roy, Mtume. Not pictured are drummer Al Foster and sitarist Khalil Balakrishna. This band features on quite a few tracks on the new OTC boxed set.

«07» I've been receiving several e-mails from folk in the US complaining that the On The Corner boxed set has still to turn up, and wanting to know why. I called Sony Legacy, and they tell me that they have production and transportation problems. The box is apparently rather difficult to make, involving a metal casing with embossed imprint, and is made in China. Small shipments are trickling into the US, and the Legacy representative couldn't say where they would be available first. The company doesn't even have promotional copies yet. He did send me what's called a 'product' shot, which you can see below... I was also sent a few images of Miles and his band in the early seventies, which I'll post in a few days. Oh, and I've begun a blog page, which will be up at the same time. So check back later this week.

September 2007

«28» A visitor to Miles Beyond made me aware that the review of The Complete On The Corner Sessions, at the allmusic.com site contains the following passage: "Bob Belden does a painstaking job of annotating this set from its inception in 1972 until the last studio date in 1975. He offers not only dates and players, but also disputes findings found in earlier discographies, and notes that in some instances either nothing took place or the tapes have been lost. He also reveals how little Miles himself plays on certain sessions, and as to whether a session was used as an overdub session or a full-on recording date."

This left the reader understandably confused, given what I've written on this site. The facts are: Bob Belden did NOT provide track by track annotations to The Complete On The Corner Sessions. The two brief essays by him that are included are excerpted from his annotations for the 2000 re-issue of On The Corner. Given that Belden has won a Grammy for previous track annotations, this anomaly is noteworthy in itself. Instead, Michael Cuscuna provides a discography and some track annotations the boxed set, and is credited as doing so. However, Cuscuna is a self-declared stranger to this music, and his annotations are therefore, inevitably, brief and sketchy. They also contain a number of mistakes that the allmusic reviewer didn't spot, for instance the mistitling of the "Turnaround" and "U-Turnaround" tracks.

The allmusic.com review was written by Thom Yurek, and it leaves one wondering whether Thom wrote his review before actually receiving the pre-release boxed set.

«28» The Complete On The Corner Sessions boxed set was earmarked for release September 25 in the US, but production problems have caused a delay of a week. The official US release date is now October 2. The UK and German release dates have been put back to October 29.

«11» Sad news: this morning Joe Zawinul died in a hospital in Vienna, his birth place. Apparently he had been suffering from cancer. His web site has a beautiful photographic tribute to him. I particularly like the text: "Joe Zawinul was born in Earth time on 07 July 1932 and was born in Eternity time on 11 September, 2007. He, and his music, will continue to inspire!" Amen to that. It was probably formulated and posted by his son Ivan, who also worked as his engineer. Our thoughts go to him and the rest of Joe's family.

I never met Joe in person, but spoke to him a number of times on the phone, and I really enjoyed his larger-than-life joviality, even as it was also clear that he didn't suffer fools gladly. Amen to that too. Zawinul was one of these rare musicians who, like Miles, kept renewing himself and kept sounding modern and relevant, until the very end. His My People album (1996) remains one of my all-time favorite works. Zawinul performed with his band until he checked into the Vienna hospital a month ago.

You can read the article on him that I wrote for Sound On Sound magazine here. As a tribute to Joe, I'll later this week finally post my long article about the making of In A Silent Way and Bitches Brew in which Joe talks at length about his work with Miles.

Jan Lohmann jumped to the rescue to answer the question I posed a few days ago. It turns out that a total of four tracks are wrongly titled on the forthcoming On The Corner boxed set. Not only are "Turnaround" and "U-Turnaround" in fact two early takes of "Agharta Prelude," but what's called "Minnie" on the boxed set is in fact something Miles titled "Mr Foster" when it was recorded 1975. The evidence for this is a) Pete Cosey told me in 2000 (he actually whistled the tune for me), b) "Mr Foster" was covered by Al Foster on his eponomously-titled solo album of 1979, and sounds exactly like what's now called "Minnie." To make matters even more confusing, an unrelated track recorded in 1973 is called "Mr Foster" on the OTC boxed set, and is therefore also mistitled.

«3» I'm still trying to establish whether in addition to the wrongly titled "Turnaround" and "U-Turnaround," two more of the tracks on the The Complete On the Corner Sessions have incorrect titles. Does anyone reading this have Al Foster's cover of the track "Mr Foster" which was released on a Japanese label in 1979? (See here for more info). If so, and you're up for sending me the charts, a written out melody, or an MP3, please contact me: mail (at) miles-beyond.com

«2» This is definitely not news, but it's new to me. Still while researching my The Complete On the Corner Sessions article, I stumbled upon one of the most entertaining and passionate reviews of the increasingly inaccurately named holy trinity of Get Up With It, Dark Magus, Agharta, and Pangaea I have ever read. It's written by psychedelic rock eccentric Julian Cope, and the review is out there. "What the jazz-loving Miles Davis fan would consider to have been an affronting (and even uncool) sell-out turns out to have been nothing less than the great Cunt of the Mother opening in a manner which she had rarely opened before. (...) In 1974-75, Miles Davis did so much more than merely glimpse eternity - he actually embraced it." Hallelujah. Embrace, or enter, or whatever your preference, the review here...

August 2007

«29» Bob Belden has recently completed his production and arrangement work on a new album called Miles From India, which features Miles Davis music played by some of the best Indian classical and jazz musicians, teamed up with alumni of the various Miles Davis groups from the past, including John McLaughlin, Michael Henderson, Dave Liebman, Jimmy Cobb, Gary Bartz, Lenny White, Pete Cosey, Vince Wilburn, Chick Corea, Mike Stern and others. Some of the tracks recorded are "In A Silent Way," "Miles Runs The Voodoo Down," "Ife," "Jean Pierre," as well as a McLaughlin original, "Miles From India." I've heard some of the music, and it sounds great. I'll be posting some pix of the session soon, and if I get permission, some streaming audio. The release date is not yet known, but probably towards the end of this year.

While researching an article about the On the Corner boxed set, I had a look at the current page on Miles Davis at Wikipedia, and was shocked. When I last looked, two years ago when writing the article about the Cellar Door boxed set, I thought that the Wikipedia entry, particularly about the electric period, was impressively good. What's there now about the electric period is a mishmash of revelant and irrelevant facts (why is it so important that Miles alledgedly said that he liked John Lydon's singing??), horrendous English, errors of fact, and stuff that appears to reflect the particular tastes of whoever wrote a particular line (writing that Carlos Garnett "highlighted" On the Corner is not only terrible English, but what about Herbie Hancock, John McLaughlin, Jack DeJohnette, etc??). I've already deleted a couple errors of fact, but I don't have the time to spend half a day cleaning up this page. I also am pretty sure that the enthusiasts who currently maintain it will not accept a wholesale re-write by one person. So here's a call to anyone reading this who knows his or her stuff about electric Miles to go in and improve Wikipedia's Miles Davis entry...

«28» Last week Sony finally released the EP Evolution of the Groove. It features five Miles tracks, among them "It's About That Time," "Honky Tonk" and "Black Satin," remixed and reinterpreted by Charley Drayton, Vince Wilburn Jr and Pat Thrall, with a contribution by Santana. You can read a review of the EP at the Allmusic site here. Written by Thom Jurek, an electric Miles affectionado, it's very positive. Though when he compares the album to Bill Laswell's Panthalassa his comments are incomprehensible and incorrect. Does anyone know what is meant by: "He [Laswell] was attempting to create a dark sound piece that evoked the spirit of Miles in his own manner of hearing"? You can read the real story of Laswell's creative vision here...

Here's something that could lead to some cognitive dissonance for those who thought that jazz had something to do with renewal and opennes to new ideas... Visit this page, scroll to the bottom and check out Wynton Marsalis' wages, three times as much as the Lincoln Jazz center's CEO! Can these possibly be a reward for Marsalis' self-appointed role as curator of traditional jazz, someone who is intent on excluding all forms of music he doesn't agree with? Certainly Marsalis has done everything in his power to discredit the electric music of Miles Davis, and of others.

«27» The final track listing of The Complete On The Corner Sessions boxed set is up and can be found here... More details will be added in the next few days, so keep checking back.

«10» Yes, more updates finally coming up. I have an advance copy of the On The Corner boxed set here, which is called, you guessed it, The Complete On The Corner Sessions. Kind of like calling a boxed set release of all the post-1967 Beatles material The Complete Sgt. Pepper Sessions. Anyway, it doesn't take away from the great material that's on this set, including one track in which Pete Cosey really lets rip... The only such Miles studio track I've heard. Sony tells me that the official release is still September 18, though it may be pushed back by one or two weeks. date The complete track listing, and other info will follow soon...

July 2007

«03» To all you Miles Davis affectionados who are by now concerned, impatient, annoyed or whatever over the lack of updates on this site: DON'T PANIC! I've been totally pre-occupied with finding a new place to live for my family and and I, and with finally moving house. We're now in the new house here in the South of France, which is great (the only thing that needs some work is the weather, which is cold and wet), but I'm in day 34 waiting for France Telecom to connect our broadband. Today FT called because they were unsure what telephone line to connect the broadband to. After 34 days!!! You get the picture. PLUS I've had a major computer crash 6 weeks ago, and lost a year's worth of data (the back-ups wouldn't load, and I'm currently working on a C drive that's a year old.)

The be and end all of this is that once my office and computer are fully up and running again, hopefully in a couple of weeks, and France Telecom has finally connected the broadband (some time before 2010), there will be some major updates, including pictures of sessions Bob Belden is currently doing with several ex Miles men and Indian musicians. Meanwhile ex-Captain Beefheart guitar virtuoso Gary Lucas was given my book, and had some nice words to say. You can read his observations halfway down this page.

See ya all later...

Februari 2007

«18» Here then, finally, the long-awaited On The Corner & Beyond track listing, including session information. The next update will feature MP3 samples of some of the previously unreleased tracks.

January 2007

«31» 2007 is hardly new anymore, but happy continuation to all you electric Miles Davis lovers anyway!

Here's the good news that you all have been waiting for: the On The Corner boxed set appears on schedule for a release in the fall of this year, PLUS I have the full 6-CD track list, which covers the period 1972-75, and permission to put it on the web.

I'm crazily overwhelmed with stuff concerning life, the universe, and tax returns at the moment, and it'll take a few days before I'll have the time to do the update. So check in later for this track list, which may even have a few MP3 snippets of the new material. The update should also—finally—feature a review of Gregory Miles' book about his father.

November 2006

«24» Today the New York Times publishes a comprehensive update of what's happening with the two in-the-works feature movies about Miles, one with a script written by Quincy Troupe, the other overseen by the Estate. You can find the article here... (you'll need to register with the NYT to be able to read it). The article also contains a brief interview with Jo Gelbard, but strangely no mention of Gregory Davis's brand new book Dark Magus: The Jekyll and Hyde Life of Miles Davis.

Gregory's ode to his father, also mentioned below, landed on my doorstep a couple of weeks ago (thank you Backbeat Books). I've not had the time to read it yet. Leafing through it, there are a number of never-seen-before photographs, and it seems that Davis' oldest son is very honestly trying to chronicle his admiration and love for his father as well as the pain their relationship caused him. I intend to post a review in the coming weeks. In fact, my plan is to review all serious books on Miles currently on the market. There are so many now that some pointers and impressions may be a good idea. Watch this space.

Bob Belden, George Avakian, George Duke and, yes, Teo Macero, are all part of a panel that's scheduled to appear at the International Association for Jazz Education's 34th annual festival, January 10-13, 2007. The topic: Producing Miles Davis. Sounds like something that's not to be missed if one's in New York. Anyone who is going and wants to write a report, please contact me.

Bob Belden informs me that he's working on a project called MILES FROM INDIA, "using the major Indian cats from the various MD bands.... Stern, Scofield, Al Foster, Ron Carter, Chick, Herbie, Bartz, Liebman, Garrett, Erin Davis and Vince so far have agreed to play with the Indian cats..." It's hard to imagine what that would be like, but it certainly should be interesting. This is all the info I have right now. More later.

October

«9» A belated mention of the fact that Miles was inducted into Hollywood’s RockWalk on September 28. To the right the poster of this event. For a newsreport on MSNBC with a picture of his son Erin, daughter Cheryl, former wife Frances, and the bronze bust of Miles, click here...

It appears that more and more children of Miles are climbing out of the woodwork and taking an interest in their father's legacy, something that's sure to lead to conflicts with the family members currently in control of the Miles Davis Estate. Below I mentioned Gregory and Peter, and how the former was miffed at not being invited for his father's induction into the Rock 'n Roll Hall Of Fame last April. In addition, Gregory, who is Miles' oldest son, has written a book. Dark Magus: The Jekyll and Hyde Life of Miles Davis will be published by Backbeat Books in November, and promises "a warts-and-all look at the real Miles Davis." On the linked page you can see a recommendation from fellow Backbeat author Philip Freeman. This prompted me to finally post the catalogue of conjecture and errors that's his book Running the Voodoo Down: The Electric Music of Miles Davis.

September

«14»The Swedish painter and poet Henry Denander has made a number of water colors of Miles, some of which you can see on this site, for instance above left. His version of the cover of Miles Beyond is below. Denander has a small exhibition of jazz paintings on his site that's well worth visiting.