For Fanatics Only: Miles Davis: The Complete Live at the Plugged Nickel, 1965

On 26 May, the centennial of the birth of the great Miles Davis was commemorated with people around the world remembering and celebrating the artist of this musical master.  Though this blogger, born the same year and in the Windy City, has long had a recording of highlights from the classic 1965 concerts of the second classic, acquiring the box set of eight discs documenting two nights of shows at Chicago's Plugged Nickel was a continuing intention until realized just a little more than a week after the 100th birthday.

Not unlike repeated listening of the box of this group's albums from 1965 to 1968, hearing these performances several times is another reminder of how subtle the revolutionary effects that Miles, pianist Herbie Hancock, saxophonist Wayne Shorter, and drummer Tony Williams, really were.  In an era when the ferment and sonic shockwaves of free jazz roiled so many, including Davis (though his own dramatic shift later was pretty stunning, as well), what this quartet did was truly remarkable.

Much of what was experimented with concerned rhythm, most obviously with what Williams, who'd just turned 20 years old, was doing with the beat, his amazing cymbal work and more, while Carter took harmony to a new level for bassists.  Hancock was masterful with space and economical accompaniments, such as through comping, while his solos flowed beautifully and melodically.  Being upfront with the leader, as well as an excellent composer, Shorter drew more attention, both for his melodic gifts and his careful placement of notes that well complemented what Davis always prized.

In his thoughtful notes, Bob Blumenthal observed that, with this young, innovative trio melding so brilliantly with the leader, whose undeniable talent for picking great musicians was never clearer than with this lineup, "ballads might turn into flagwavers, flagwavers into head-shaking groovers," even as Davis relied heavily in his repertoire on such chestnuts as "Stella by Starlight," "My Funny Valentine," "All of You," and "On Green Dolphin Street," while "Agitation" was the only recent original and others, such as "So What," "All Blues," "Walkin'," and "Milestones" hearkened back to Davis' storied career.

It has long been felt that for a few years prior to this period, Davis was in a rut, though the Seven Steps to Heaven box set, to be featured here in the future, shows that there was plenty of great playing then and the Sam Rivers experiment with Miles in Tokyo is, to this listener, a fascinating one.  It is definitely the case, however, as this set amply demonstrates, that this quartet was truly something special and one for the ages.

Miles Davis Quintet: 1965-'68, The Complete Columbia Studio Recordings

Another jazz giant has left us with the death of the great saxophonist and composer Wayne Shorter. He, pianist Herbie Hancock, the incredible bassist Ron Carter and the phenomenal drummer Tony Williams worked with Davis for several years in the 1960s as what is often called Davis's "second great quintet."  This followed 1950s group that included John Coltrane, Red Garland, Paul Chambers and Philly Jo Jones, after which, in the early Sixties, Davis worked extensively with pianist and composer Gil Evans as well as various members of small ensembles.

Carter and Williams linked up with Davis in 1963 and, while the leader badly wanted Shorter to join his band, a commitment with Art Blakey and The Jazz Messengers, of which the saxophonist was musical director, meant that it was not until September 1964 that Shorter became part of the quintet, which previously included George Coleman and the avant-garde giant Sam Rivers.

Starting with E.S.P. and concluding with Filles de Kilimajaro, the five masters created works, live and in studio, that took the "modal" concept Miles developed previously and extended its possibilities in terms of song structure, the use of rhythm and in other ways and ended on the edge of fusion.  While Williams deservedly received a great deal of attention for his revolutionary way of drumming, it is impossible to overstate the importance of Shorter in terms of his playing, but especially, his compositions.

This box set moves chronologically through sessions that began in January 1965 in Columbia Records' Los Angeles studio and culminated in June 1968, with everything recorded since taking place at the label's main complex in New York.  Seventeen pieces written by the saxophonist were taped during the sessions that yielded five albums and material appearing on four compilations, including such notable tunes as "Footprints," "Nefertiti," "E.S.P.," "Masqualero," "Orbits," and "Paraphernalia."

Shorter's soloing was always lyrical, never about showing off how fast he could play, and in service of the material and the band.  His saxophone, naturally, was both a complement and a contrast to Davis' trumpet, as well as to Hancock's piano, but it's really more vital to think about the quintet as a true unit, united to realize the leader's vision while also expressing individual styles and playing off each other in what rrally seems to be a telepathic way.

Over the years, I thought about exploring Shorter's significant catalog of solo recordings, in addition to the fusion giant he co-founded, Weather Report.  When it came out in 1997, I purchased his duet album with Hancock, 1+1, but it may now be time to hear more of this important figure's work outside of the Davis quintet.  First, though, it's time to dig deep into this box set to appreciate Shorter's work with that ensemble and may he rest in peace. 

Sam Rivers: Fuchsia Swing Song

For this listener, Sam Rivers' many great albums from the early 1970s onward represent the best of his most daring, diverse and interesting compositions, but there is no denying the superb qualities of his debut, 1964's Fuchsia Swing Song.

It's amazing that Rivers was 41 before he cut this album at the end of that year, but at least he lived long enough to generate some really remarkable recordings.  He'd toured with Miles Davis in Japan during the summer, with young drummer Tony Williams encouraging Davis to hire Rivers, though it did not, apparently, go well with the mercurial trumpeter and leader.  The resulting album, Miles in Tokyo, is intriguing because of how different Rivers sounded compared to George Coleman, whom he replaced, and Wayne Shorter, who replaced him.

That difference is mostly in Rivers' grainy sound, his powerful sense of dynamics, crackling runs, stunning fluidity and unusual approach to melody and rhythm.  When it came to making his first recording, Rivers brought in the Davis rhythm section of Williams (who'd first played professionally at 13 with Rivers in Boston) and the great Ron Carter on bass.  Rounding out the lineup is the fine pianist Jaki Byard, who'd been in a band with Rivers years before and also was an important contributor to the bands of Charles Mingus and Eric Dolphy.  It is notable that Rivers rarely recorded with a pianist, but Byard's history with the leader and his sympathetic playing makes it work well.

Fuchsia Swing Song definitely has the bop touch to it, with a strong dose of blues, especially in Byard's comping and light touch while soloing ("Luminous Monolith" even features a brief snippet that sounds like barrelhouse-style playing). Williams makes tremendous use of his amazing cymbal along with fantastic polyrhythmic work, while Carter is typically stellar in his highly supportive playing.  Given his first opportunity to showcase his playing, Rivers takes full advantage and makes full use of his abilities.  "Beatrice," named for the leader's wife, is a rare and pretty ballad, showing Rivers' ability to yield warm and still challenging solos.

Rivers went on to record a few more sides for Blue Note, which embraced the so-called "avant garde" in the mid-Sixties, signing Dolphy, Andrew Hill, Ornette Coleman, Cecil Taylor and others, but the label was sold and most of these musicians stopped recording for Blue Note by 1968.  He had a fruitful and notably freer period with Impulse in the first part of the Seventies and then recorded for many smaller labels over the years, including his own Rivbea Sound. 

Rivers died at the end of 2011 at age 88, still nowhere near as recognized as he should have been because he was one of the greatest and most distinctive composers and players in jazz for some 45 years.  Fuchsia Swing Song is where it all started and is a great introduction to the work of this unsung master.

Arcana: The Last Wave

Bill Laswell has made it one of his stocks-in-trade to bring together musicians who have not or would not likely be found together in the studio or on stage and give them the leeway to do their thing.  While such experiments may not always be successful, they are almost always interesting.

After the death of the staggering guitarist Sonny Sharrock put an end of the pounding, uber-loud quarter Last Exit, which intermittently performed from 1986 to the early 1990s, Laswell put together the Arcana project, centered around the remarkable drummer Tony Williams and the idiosyncratic guitarist Derek Bailey with Laswell, as always, keeping the bottom line with his bass consistent and accommodating to the other instrumentalists.

In April 1995, Williams, Bailey and Laswell entered the bassist's Greenpoint Studio in Brooklyn and recorded The Last Wave, a churning, boiling, blasting and freely chaotic collection of improvisations that, when it works, is astounding.

This is especially true in the opening "Broken Circle," in which Bailey wails away with his angular approach to the electric guitar, while Williams pounds away with hard washes of cymbals and aggressive snare attacks.  Laswell wisely plays it cool and doesn't try to match the power and propulsion provided by his bandmates.

"Cold Blast" starts out slow and atmospheric, with Williams using his cymbals as a wash of sound, Bailey picks out bits of discordant notes and Laswell lays out undertones of bass.  When Williams starts hitting paired notes and occasional long fills, which is common on this recording, on his snare and Laswell plays with heavy rhythms on his eight-string bass, Bailey is all over the place coaxing strange and wonderful sounds from his axe.  About 4:45 in the piece really comes together with Williams hitting his stride with great fill and cymbal work to correspond with Bailey's always restless explorations and Laswell holds down the bottom end admirably.

The lengthiest track is "Pearls and Transformation" with Bailey's jagged and trebly riffs underlaid by Williams' polyrhytmic approach that is familiar to those who've heard the drummer's music from Miles Davis to Lifetime and elsewhere.  Again, Laswell keeps his bass playing simple and in control to allow the others to riff accordingly.  The piece goes quiet and atmospheric about 2 1/2 minutes in and again at about 6  and then 11 minutes and then goes into some interesting exploratory group improvising that might sound like aimless noodling, but, to this hearer, is a cohesive journey taken by three musicians that do listen to each other even while pushing and prodding to move in several directions during the long piece.

Produced by Laswell with assistance from longtime collaborator John Zorn and his Japanese partner in the Tzadik label, Kazunori Sugiyama and released on the Japanese DIW/Disk Union label, the recording, by Laswell stalwarts Robert Musso as engineer and Layng Martine assisting, is clear and crystalline and makes the most of cleanly distinguishing the instruments.

Miles Davis: In a Silent Way

Saxophonist Bob Belden died a few weeks back and, while he was a well-known and respected musician, he also was a contributor to some of the remarkable box sets issued by Sony/Columbia Records regarding the music of the great Miles Davis.

One of the sets in which Belden made a significant contribution concerns one of the great Davis recordings, 1969's In a Silent Way.  This album marked Davis's first extensive use of electric instrumentation, but it also represented a shift in composing style and recording techniques employed by the trumpeter and his long-time producer, Teo Macero.

What is striking about this album compared to recent Davis releases with his great quintet (Hancock, Carter, Williams and Shorter) and anything else from the period is not so much that he used electric instruments, but that he created a type of sound that was more atmospheric and groove-oriented.

Bassist Dave Holland, whose dexterity, speed and power have been amply demonstrated elsewhere, plays highly repetitive lines here, but it's perfectly in service to the music Davis orchestrated.  Tony Williams, whose mastery of the cymbals was exceptional, largely plays that part of his kit for the recording, excepting towards the end of the recording.  Keyboardists Herbie Hancock, Chick Corea and Joe Zawinul, all brilliant players, are primarily concerned with laying down the ambiance that anchors the album.

The soloists are Davis, Wayne Shorter and, getting his first major exposure in the music world, the incredible John McLaughlin on guitar.  The interplay between Shorter and Davis, honed over just beyond four years of working together, is clear and precise.  Hearing the two, though, with the five-man rhythm section playing the way they did, is fresh and new compared to the quintet music that preceded this record.

McLaughlin is really, however, the linchpin of this record.  His guitar work is at times subtle, at other times direct, and usually inventive and unique.  He expanded his sonic palette on the phenomenal Bitches Brew, along with an augmented and beefed up ensemble that Davis employed.  On In a Silent Way, though, Laughlin gets more of the spotlight because of the way the sound was constructed.

Another key player is producer Teo Macero, whose uncanny way of working with Davis's methods of recording and concepts behind the music often generated some remarkable results.  Macero's edits are sometimes very jarring, as is the case with side two's In a Silent Way/It's About That Time, but his work deserves praise for the creative way in which he stitched the recordings together.  This process became more marked with subsequent records and it has been hotly debated whether there was merit in much of this.  Clearly, though, Davis wanted Macero to work in this way and, on this record, the results are excellent.

This may not be an apt corollary, but, to this listener, there is something about this record that is akin to the Birth of the Cool recordings.  It is probably more in the general sound and tempo--in which the ambiance and mid-tempo stylings are effected.  Yet, the album is anything but a reference to the past, at least not directly.  Instead, it is an emphatic nod (and it is subtle, like a nod--whereas Bitches Brew was a direct shake of the yead) toward the future.

Miles did what he needed to do after several years with the quintet to move his music in a different direction, but, in doing so, he incorporated the spirit of (and, often, direct connections to) rock, soul, pop and modern classical music.

In a Silent Way was an almost ambient way to chart new directions, where Bitches Brew was a powerful pathbreaking effort.  They are perfect companions to show where, 20 years in as a leader, Miles was going to go next.  He was called a sellout for using electric instruments and making references to popular and other forms of music.  But, how can you sell out, when you're making album long sides of 20 minutes or more?

Miles wasn't selling out, he was moving on.  The fact that he could do so, once again changing his style, personnel, composing, production and editing, and image and create another chapter in his career, when most of his contemporaries were still playing the same way they had done in the Forties, Fifties or early Sixties is testament to his greatness.  In a Silent Way is an amazing record, somewhat overshadowed by Bitches Brew, when, perhaps, it should be seen as a precursor and direct linkage.

Eric Dolphy: Out to Lunch

Recorded just a few months before his untimely death from uremia in Berlin in 1964, Eric Dolphy's Out to Lunch is a phenomenal combination of fine originals by the leader and a stellar band of some of the greatest musicians of the era. 

Joining Dolphy, who, as usual, is featured on several instruments, including alto sax, flute and bass clarinet, are trumpeter Freddie Hubbard, Bobby Hutcherson on vibes and a tremendous rhythm section of bassist Richard Davis and teenage sensation Tony Williams on drums.  In fact, Davis and Williams take full advantage of the freedom and opportunities given them by Dolphy's excellent compositions and arrangements, for which, as with his playing, he was given so little credit and recognition.

The Thelonious Monk tribute, "Hat and Beard," has a cool, start with Williams' cymbal work setting the rhythmic tone and then Dolphy's circular clarinet lines quietly stating its own rhythm, soon joined by Hutcherson's vibes.  Hubbard and Dolphy have tight harmonics on the interesting, innovative theme before the leader launches into a crazy solo, full of the inventiveness, vigor, unusual note combinations and other dynamics, including human-like cries and moans, that made him controversial then, but still fresh and new just about a half-century later.

The melancholy ballad "Something Sweet, Something Tender" has a great bowed opening by Davis accompanying Dolphy's clarinet playing and Hubbard does an excellent job harmonizing with the leader on the theme that follows.  There is another great Dolphy solo

"Gazzeloni" is an opportunity for Dolphy to demonstrate his flutistry (if that is a word) and Davis' well-executed walking lines and Williams' signature cymbal work and solid, understated fills are perfect accompaniments for Dolphy's otherworldly theme statement and his wild and staggering solo work that follows.  But, as interesting is the eerie playing of Hutcherson, whose placement of sounds is unusual, but highly compelling.  Hubbard's solo is somewhat conventional, given the setting, pieces and players, but he does a great job trying to extend his playing beyond what he was usually doing at the time, being one of the busiest players in jazz.  Hutcherson gets to solo towards the end of the piece and, while nicely done, it seems less noteworthy than his accompaniment during Dolphy's solo.

The title track is a march set in motion by Williams before the theme comes in with Hutcherson's off-kilter and repetitious playing standing out while Dolphy and Hubbard again play in unison.  Then, there is another mind-numbing solo on the alto by the leader.  Davis is wide-ranging here, plucking in the upper and lower registers of the bass with subtlety and invention, while Williams does his usual excellent job of keeping rhythm with powerful snare hits, rolls and fills and that amazing cymbal playing.  Here, Hubbard seems more assertive and comfortable in his lengthy solo, perhaps because of the stronger rhythmic foundation laid down by Hutcherson, Davis and Williams, who follow Hubbard with what could be described as simultaneous soloing, though avoiding formal steady rhythms permeates the entire record anyway.

"Straight Up and Down" might be an ironic title for the unusual theme that opens the tune and which is played longer than the head arrangements on the other tracks and Dolphy heads into the stratosphere with another careening, speech-like solo on alto that capsulizes all of the interesting colorations and devices that characterized his short, but startling career, then in essentially his fifth year as a bandleader.  Hubbard's solo, again, sounds traditional when following the leader, but it does show that he was earnestly trying to work in the "out there" environment Dolphy was creating and the trumpeter should get more credit for the effort--the solo comes out well.

Speaking of "out there," that was a title on earlier record, another Dolphy classic to be featured here someday, put out by Prestige Records and which, like Out to Lunch with its absurdist photo of a "Will Be Back" sign at a restaurant with hands pointing in all directions, was intended to spotlight Dolphy as a true "avant gardist," working far outside the bounds of "traditional" jazz.  Perhaps, but Dolphy took far too much hostile criticism for what turned out to be adventurous, creative, and well thought-put advances in a music that had been in a pretty stale repetitive doldrums of bop for almost fifteen years by the time he began making his own records.

Out to Lunch proved to be Eric Dolphy's greatest album, though, as in all cases with someone who dies too soon, who knows what he would have done when so-called "free jazz" really took off in subsequent years.  In any case, this is a fabulous recording that shows free playing can be done with great inventiveness, arranging and playing by a fantastic band and one of the great, unsung leaders in jazz history.

Eric Dolphy:  Out to Lunch (Blue Note, 1964)

1.  Hat and Beard  8:24
2.  Something Sweet, Something Tender  6:02
3.  Gazzelloni  7:22
4.  Out to Lunch  12:06
5.  Straight Up and Down  8:19

Andrew Hill: Point of Departure

For some inexplicable reason, Andrew Hill remains a largely overlooked pianist and composer, whose 1960s works for Blue Note Records are among the best of that era.  Maybe it's that he wasn't a terribly flashy player, but instead used his keyboard work in the service of the piece and of the remarkable musicians who appear on this record.  It might also be that, as jazz was starting to enter the so-called "free jazz" era, Hill's work was not nearly as adventurous as those of the "avant garde" musicians.  This may be contested by some, but, in a way, Hill's directions remind me a bit of what Miles Davis was starting to do at about the same time with his "second great quintet."  That is, the overall direction wasn't as overtly revolutionary as what Cecil Taylor, Ornette Coleman, John Coltrane, Albert Ayler and others were creating, but there was a quieter transformation of how freedom was being utilized in an ensemble setting.

The common linkage between Davis and Hill was the rhythmic underpinnings and innovations of the very young Tony Williams, the then-18 and 1/2 year old drum wizard whose sense of openness in time-keeping allows everyone to move more freely in their solos. 

The horn section was an interesting combination of Kenny Dorham, Joe Henderson, and Eric Dolphy.  Dorham, a hard bop notable on trumpet, plays with a coolness that pairs well with Hill's understated way of accompanying the soloist.  It might be telling that Dorham, whose experience of playing with Coltrane and Taylor in 1958's Hard Driving Jazz, even when those two hadn't gotten anywhere near the freer expressions that came later, was, by all accounts, a miserable one, does much better here with Hill. 

Tenor sax player Henderson was something of a newcomer, having mustered out of Army service in 1962, but quickly gained a foothold as a leader for Blue Note and a side musician for Dorham, pianist Horace Silver, and trumpeter Lee Morgan.  He also had a hard bop sound generally, but also moved into some freer territory.  Later, he recorded with McCoy Tyner, Herbie Hancock and on Alice Coltrane's masterpiece Ptah the El-Daoud, soon to be profiled here.

Then, there's the phenomenal Eric Dolphy, featured on his usual mix of alto sax, flute and bass clarinet and whose unusual groupings of notes and angular, visceral playing is a contrast to Dorham.  Dolphy's sound is so distinctive and foreceful that his solos totally stand out, even as Dorham and Henderson perform excellently in the overall context of the band.

This leaves the rhythm section of the great Richard Davis on bass and Williams.  Davis, whom this blogger had a chance to see lead his own band at Catalina Bar and Grill in Los Angeles some twenty years ago,  was so highly regarded by Hill that the leader called him "the greatest bass player in existence" and a master of tone, technical ability and creativity.  Hill even noted that he wrote piano parts with Davis in mind so that the bassist could "pick out the notes he wants to use."  Davis played on Dolphy's monumental Out to Lunch! recorded for Blue Note less than a month before Point of Departure and on many other great jazz records.  He also, however, appeared on recordings by Van Morrison (the sublime Astral Weeks, also to be covered here), Bruce Springsteen and Paul Simon.

As for the leader, he has great lyrical ideas, a masterful command of tempo and beat, and innovative, if not (again) overly grandiose, solo concepts.  And, with such a stellar band on hand and with great pieces like the opened "Refuge," "New Monastery" (obviously referring to the master, Thelonious Monk), and the beautiful and haunting closing ballad, "Dedication," he had the perfect settng in which to create his masterwork.

Already using the state-of-the-art studio and engineering talents of Rudy van Gelder, this album benefitted further from a 1998 remastering by van Gelder for what is known as the RVG Edition.  Extra bonuses include alternate takes of "New Monastery," "Flight 19" and "Dedication."

Hill made other excellent albums for Blue Note in the mid-60s including Compulsion!!!! and Black Fire, but Point of Departure is the pinnacle and easily one of the great albums of the era or any other in jazz.  It's a shame that Hill, who died in 2007, is still  so under-recognized.

Andrew Hill:  Point of Departure (Blue Note, 1964)

1.  Refuge  12:12
2.  New Monastery  7:00
3.  Spectrum  9:42
4.  Flight 19  4:10
5.  Dedication  6:40

1998 remastered edition bonus tracks

6.  New Monastery (alternate take)  6:08
7.  Flight 19 (alternate take)  3:45
8.  Dedication (alternate take)  7:01