Miles Davis
photo: Don Hunstein
100 articles
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Miles Davis: London, Hammersmith Odeon
Live Review by Richard Cook, New Musical Express, 7 May 1983
MILES RUNS the voodoo down down down ... and here I am, somewhere way up in the high heights of the Odeon (gee I hate ...
Audio interviews
Interview by Mark Sinker, Rock's Backpages audio, 1988
The saxophone star talks about his place in the music; working in different areas and avoiding formula; what he looks for in musicians he plays with, and working with young musicians; the place of improvisation in his music; explorations with Miles Davis, and the 1965 Plugged Nickel sessions; his love of science fiction; creating space in music; the impact of rock in the sixties, and bringing back the fun that jazz lacked.
File format: mp3; file size: 43.6mb, interview length: 45' 25" sound quality: ***½
List of articles in the library
Miles Davis Quintet: Memorial Auditorium, Stanford University, Stanford CA
Live Review by Philip Elwood, The San Francisco Examiner, 23 May 1966
The Best, by Miles Davis ...
Miles Davis: Davis Has His Best Jazz Unit
Profile by Philip Elwood, The San Francisco Examiner, 18 April 1967
THE MILES Davis Quintet which enters its last week at the Both/And tonight is an exhilarating and important jazz ensemble. ...
Newport Jazz Festival 1969: New Records & Not All That Jazz
Live Review by Ian Dove, Billboard, 19 July 1969
NEWPORT, R.I. — On paper at least the experiment of adding rock music to the Newport Jazz Festival 1969 came from the purest of motives. ...
Mass Music: The Band, Allman Brothers, Tony Williams and Miles Davis
Review by Miller Francis Jr., The Great Speckled Bird, 8 December 1969
EACH OF the record albums discussed here could be termed a masterpiece worthy of a full-length "rave." But the Review format can often be nothing ...
Miles Davis: Fillmore East, New York NY
Live Review by Mike Jahn, The New York Times, 7 March 1970
MILES DAVIS PLAYS AT A ROCK CONCERT ...
Neil Young, Steve Miller, Miles Davis: Fillmore East, New York NY
Live Review by Ian Dove, Billboard, 21 March 1970
THE INTEREST in Miles Davis' East Village debut lay in the fact that for the past year he has supposedly been moving towards contemporary rock ...
Grateful Dead, Miles Davis: Fillmore West, San Francisco CA
Live Review by Philip Elwood, The San Francisco Examiner, 10 April 1970
Miles' Marvelous Montage ...
Live Review by Philip Elwood, The San Francisco Examiner, 25 April 1970
Miles Davis Stirs Up New Sounds ...
Miles Davis: Both/And, San Francisco CA
Live Review by Philip Elwood, The San Francisco Examiner, 6 May 1970
Miles Undeniably Great ...
Interview by Richard Williams, Melody Maker, 13 June 1970
Richard Williams talks to bassist Dave Holland in New York. ...
Miles Davis: Bitches Brew (CBS 66236)
Review by Richard Williams, Melody Maker, 27 June 1970
Bitches Brew an aural acid trip from Miles ...
John McLaughlin: The Truth Comes Out
Interview by Dave Marsh, Creem, July 1970
IT IS amazing that John McLaughlin has not become more renowned than he already is. He's the most thoroughly progressive genius of that instrument ever. ...
Miles Davis & Louis Armstrong: You Learn How to Defend Your Style
Essay by Al Aronowitz, Rolling Stone, 9 July 1970
NEW YORK — There was something sad about it, this party thrown by old men for someone older still, and yet you had to have ...
Miles Davis: Bitches Brew (Columbia GP 26)
Review by Richard C. Walls, Creem, August 1970
THIS MUSIC seems to inspire a reluctance to talk about it. To talk about it in any specific terms — all the reviews I've read ...
The Isle of Wight Festival: Five Days That Rocked Britain
Report by Mark Plummer, Michael Watts, Chris Welch, Richard Williams, Melody Maker, 5 September 1970
MM's Richard Williams, Chris Welch, Michael Watts and Mark Plummer present a five-page report on an amazing weekend of music and other scenes... ...
Miles Davis: Rock Is A White Man's Word, Says Miles
Report and Interview by Al Aronowitz, Melody Maker, 17 October 1970
NEW YORK — Junior Mance was working the bandstand at New York's Top of the Gate and you had to put your ear to Miles ...
Follow Pianist Herbie Hancock On a Trip into the World of Jazz
Interview by Mike Gormley, Detroit Free Press, 19 December 1970
Meet Miles Davis, Ramsey Lewis And Oscar Peterson To Learn About the Kinds of Music That Are Sneaking into Rock ...
Miles Davis: Jack Johnson (Columbia S30455)
Review by Dave Marsh, Creem, 1971
MILES' NEW popularity is a puzzle to me. While his previous three records — the almost-perfect In a Silent Way, and the renowned (if, in ...
Miles Davis: A Tribute to Jack Johnson (CBS 70089; £2.19)
Review by Roy Carr, New Musical Express, 11 September 1971
FOR WELL over two decades of music, trumpeter Miles Davis has remained as one of the few unchallenged innovators and to this day he still ...
Profile by Colman Andrews, Creem, November 1972
MILES IS AN absolute mother-fucker of a musician. He's just simply one of the most vitally important makers of music that stalks the earth today, ...
Miles Davis: On The Corner (CBS)
Review by Ian MacDonald, New Musical Express, 17 February 1973
I WAS LYING around listening to Miles Smiles the other day, thinking about how it's a great record. And then I remembered the 30-odd other ...
Miles Davis: On the Corner (Columbia)
Review by Colman Andrews, Creem, March 1973
IT'S SHORT, punchy, beefy music, taut, untattered (tight) and tautological. Tautological? Yes, because it's internally consistent. It's true to its school. Quel school? Well... ...
Miles Davis: Rainbow Theatre, London
Live Review by Chris Welch, Melody Maker, 24 November 1973
WATCHING MILES Davis and his band perform is a fascinating exercise that provides much food for thought. One goes willing to cast out old ideas ...
Miles Davis: Big Fun (Columbia)
Review by Vernon Gibbs, Phonograph Record, July 1974
SO MANY expletives have been deleted in praise of this honorable sage, that I feel it necessary to set the record straight. Miles Davis is ...
Miles Davis: Young Man with a Horn
Retrospective by Brian Case, New Musical Express, 14 September 1974
THE EARLY YEARS OF MILES DAVIS: on the bandstand with Bird where changes came fast and tricky... to keep fools away. ...
Miles Davis: Not Waving But Drowning?
Retrospective by Brian Case, New Musical Express, 28 September 1974
Miles Dewey Davis, Part Two...in which the temperamental Frank Sinatra of jazz swings a pugnacious blow at the faithful by blowing a little jazz-rock ...
Interview by Robin Katz, Sounds, 2 August 1975
The ex-wife or Miles Davis is now making it on her own account. Robin Katz reports ...
Betty Davis: Putting the Miles behind her
Interview by Robin Katz, Let It Rock, October 1975
BETTY DAVIS is the amazon-sized, raucous, screeching ex-wife of Miles Davis who has copped (unofficially) this year's award for best B-side of a flop single. ...
Wayne Shorter: From Mr. Weird to the Hollywood Hills
Interview by Brian Case, New Musical Express, 13 December 1975
Here's WAYNE SHORTER taking care of business. TCB. And what business — taking in the days with Maynard, the Messengers, and Miles right through to today's WEATHER ...
Blow for Love and Money: Crossover Jazz in the Seventies
Overview by Davitt Sigerson, Black Music, March 1977
In the first part of a detailed investigation Davitt Sigerson chronicles how "jazz" found its way back to the commercial big league. ...
Miles Davis: Dark Magus (CBS/Sony 40AP 741-2, 2 LPs, Japanese import)
Review by Richard Williams, Melody Maker, 28 January 1978
Dark side of Miles ...
Interview by Richard Williams, Melody Maker, 4 March 1978
At the end of his first-ever British tour, Gil Evans, jazz arranger extraordinary and mentor of Miles Davis, talks to Richard Williams ...
Essay by Lester Bangs, Musician, April 1980
IN A New York City nightclub, a skinny little Caucasian whose waterfall hairstyle and set of snout and lips make him look like a sullen ...
Jack DeJohnette: More Than One Way
Interview by Don Snowden, L.A. Weekly, 1 May 1980
"PEOPLE ARE beginning to take notice that I'm not just a drummer who plays piano or a piano player who plays drums," says Jack DeJohnette. ...
Profile and Interview by David Nathan, Blues & Soul, 1 July 1980
Having first met as members of the Miles Davis Band, Mtume & Lucas immediately sparked a mutual creative change which has resulted in a plethora ...
Mick and Miles (A Musical in Several Parts)
Essay by Al Aronowitz, The Blacklisted Masterpieces of Al Aronowitz, 1981
A remarkable personal reminiscence of the night the author took rock star Mick Jagger to meet jazz star Miles Davis turns into rock/jazz history and ...
Miles Davis: Kool Jazz Festival, New York
Live Review by Richard Grabel, New Musical Express, 25 July 1981
Miles behind ...
Miles Davis: The Man With The Horn (Columbia)
Review by Richard C. Walls, Creem, November 1981
MILES FINALLY RELEASES THE PAUSE BUTTON ...
Miles Davis: Hammersmith Odeon, London
Live Review by Richard Cook, New Musical Express, 1 May 1982
I HADN'T EXPECTED too much. These are Miles Davis' Twilight years. There are younger and cooler cats to torch the way: Miles took the major ...
Miles Davis: We Want Miles (CBS 88579)
Review by Brian Case, Melody Maker, 22 May 1982
Miles and miles of smiles ...
Interview by J.D. Considine, Musician, May 1984
THE FUNKY THROUGH-LINE BEHIND LUTHER VANDROSS & ARETHA; THE JAZZY AGITATOR BEHIND MILES, GROVER & SANBORN ...
Miles Davis: Royal Festival Hall, London
Live Review by Richard Cook, New Musical Express, 4 August 1984
BLOWIN' HOT AND COOL ...
Teo Macero: Thoughts of Chairman Teo
Interview by Max Jones, The Wire, November 1984
TEO MACERO is best known as the producer of dozens of classic Miles Davis LPs, from Sketches Of Spain to Star People. Here he talks ...
Miles Davis: You're Under Arrest (Columbia)
Review by Fred Goodman, Musician, June 1985
MILES DAVIS' brilliance is so often attributed to his musical innovations and refusal to coast on past accomplishments that it's easy to overlook his talent ...
Miles Davis: You’re Under Arrest (CBS)
Review by Charles Shaar Murray, New Musical Express, 15 June 1985
THIS YEAR, Miles Davis is 59 years old. However, if it’s round numbers that appeal to you, it’s worth mentioning that 1985 marks the 40th ...
Miles Davis: You're Under Arrest (CBS)
Review by Brian Case, Melody Maker, 15 June 1985
JUDGING BY the cover shots of Miles looking studiedly dangerous with a sub-machinegun, and judging by the music too, the great man is after the ...
Miles Davis: You're Under Arrest (Columbia FC 40023)
Review by Richard C. Walls, High Fidelity, July 1985
MILES'S LATEST is a very mixed bag, sounding, in fact, like excerpts from three different albums. On four cuts, the trumpeter is presented in a ...
Miles Davis: Miles Runs The Voodoo Down
Interview by Richard Cook, New Musical Express, 13 July 1985
The man with the horn, MILES DAVIS, whose silvery trumpet lines have embellished jazz for 40 years, is back in action with a new band ...
Review by Richard Cook, New Musical Express, 17 July 1985
Richard Cook takes two Davis records, a quarter-century apart, into custody. ...
Miles Davis: Royal Festival Hall, London
Live Review by David Sinclair, The Times, 22 July 1985
DRAWING THE curtain on this year's JVC/Capital Radio Festival, Miles Davis was on buoyant and industrious form. Now in the twilight of an illustrious career ...
Miles Davis: Montreux Jazz Festival, Casino de Montreux
Live Review by Roy Carr, New Musical Express, 3 August 1985
DADDY COOL! ...
Overview by Brian Case, Melody Maker, 19 October 1985
MILES DAVIS has been one of the single most influential figures in the history and development of modern jazz, not only through his playing and ...
Miles Davis: Man of many colours
Interview by Roy Carr, New Musical Express, 20 September 1986
Miles to work with Prince? Maybe. Sinatra? Possibly. Wynton Marsalis? Splatch! Forty years on there's Tutu, and the hues and cries of MILES DAVIS — ...
Miles Davis: Tutu (Warner Bros.)
Review by Brian Case, Melody Maker, 11 October 1986
EXQUISITE MILES once again in a dubious context. His personal playing — and there is plenty of it on Tutu — is as inventive and ...
Review by Don Watson, New Musical Express, 11 October 1986
SO, THE last two, troubled decades of Miles Davis — from Voodoo to Tutu, from the blistering frustration of On The Corner to the comfortable ...
Miles Davis: Wembley Conference Centre, London
Live Review by Richard Williams, The Times, 19 November 1986
Struggling to turn the clock back ...
Miles Davis: Tutu (Warner Bros.)
Review by Mark Rowland, Musician, December 1986
TUTU IS A pop album. Tutu is a jazz album. Wait, you're both right! Tutu seems unlikely to pry many new converts from either camp, ...
Marcus Miller: Bass For All Seasons
Interview by Gene Santoro, Guitar World, June 1987
What is it about MARCUS MILLER'S eternal thump that makes him Miles' choice bottom and the Bee Gees' top choice? ...
Marcus Miller: Bass for All Seasons
Interview by Gene Santoro, Guitar World, June 1987
What is it about MARCUS MILLER'S eternal thump that makes him Miles' choice bottom and the Bee Gees' top choice? ...
A little loving goes Miles and miles. Miles Davis: Royal Festival Hall, London
Live Review by Adam Sweeting, The Guardian, 1 July 1987
Adam Sweeting finds one of Jazz's greatest innovators in masterful form at the Festival Hall ...
Miles Davis: The Man With The Horn
Retrospective and Interview by Gene Santoro, Pulse!, June 1988
IT'S DRIZZLING on an unseasonably warm spring day in New York; even the huge bay windows in this suite on the upper reaches of the ...
Miles Davis: Miles, The Autobiography
Book Review by Lloyd Bradley, Q, February 1990
THE PERFECT BIOGRAPHY, operating on three levels: an insight into Davis's often abrasive personality; an on-the-spot commentary on the evolution of jazz as a music ...
Miles Davis Inspired 4 Decades Of Jazz
Obituary by Geoffrey Himes, Evening Sun (Baltimore), The , 30 September 1991
FEW JAZZMEN are ever identified with even one major innovation in the music. Miles Davis, who died Saturday at age 65, was associated with at ...
Freddie Hubbard: From The University Of A&M (Art & Miles, Of Course)
Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Downbeat, October 1991
WHEN A 20-year-old Freddie Hubbard moved from Indianapolis to New York in 1958, every young trumpeter was being compared to Miles Davis, who was then ...
Obituary by David Stubbs, Melody Maker, 12 October 1991
JAZZ TRUMPETER Miles Davis, who died last week in Santa Monica, was a 20th century genius on a par with Picasso in that he was ...
Miles Dewey Davis III (1926-1991)
Obituary by Fred Dellar, New Musical Express, 12 October 1991
"Jazz is ignored because the white man likes to win everything. White people like to see other white people win – and they can't win ...
Obituary by Richard Cook, The Wire, November 1991
Richard Cook reflects on the great trumpeter's passing. ...
Interview by Fred Shuster, Downbeat, June 1992
IT'S A BRIGHT, sunny Sunday afternoon in Los Angeles and Joe Zawinul is motioning towards the Pacific Ocean far below the patio of his hillside ...
Miles Davis with Easy Mo Bee: Doo-Bop (Warner Bros.)
Review by Mark Rowland, Musician, June 1992
THE RAP ON MILES ...
Ryuichi Sakamoto: invisible jukebox
Interview by Mark Sinker, The Wire, October 1994
Every month we play a musician a series of records which they're asked to identify and comment on — with no prior knowledge of what ...
Robert Wyatt: Invisible Jukebox
Interview by Mike Barnes, The Wire, December 1995
Every month we play a musician a series of records which they're asked to identify and comment on — with no prior knowledge of what ...
John McLaughlin: God of Fusion
Retrospective and Interview by Colin Harper, unpublished, 1996
Author’s note: I reviewed John’s Cork Jazz Festival gig circa January 1996, and then interviewed him in London shortly after that. Features based on the ...
Miles Davis and Gil Evans: The Complete Columbia Studio Recordings
Review by Ben Edmonds, MOJO, October 1996
THEIR CURIOUS YET inspired partnership resulted in music of rare beauty. Ben Edmonds salutes a landmark box set that fully captures the genius of Miles ...
Tony Williams: Tribute to Tony
Obituary by Jon Newey, Jazzwise, April 1997
Tony Williams' sudden death in February has deprived us of one of our foremost drummers. Jon Newey pays tribute to a musical master ...
Alan Douglas: Thee Man Who Sold The Underworld
Retrospective and Interview by Edwin Pouncey, The Wire, July 1997
Now into his fifth decade at the doors of perception, label boss ALAN DOUGLAS hasworked with many of the century's underground greats, from Lenny Bruce, ...
Gary Carner (Ed.): Miles Davis Companion; Chris Potash (Ed.): Jimi Hendrix Companion (Omnibus)
Book Review by David Stubbs, Uncut, March 1998
THESE TWO volumes comprise anthologies of journalism, contemporary and retrospective, about two great black musicians of the 20th century whose brilliance was not usually matched ...
The Miles Davis Quintet 1965-1968: The Complete Columbia Studio Recordings
Retrospective by James Maycock, The Independent, March 1998
"YOU GET THE RIGHT GUYS to play the right things at the right time and you got a motherfucker!" recalled Miles Davis in his inimitable ...
Miles Davis Quintet 1965-68: Complete Columbia Studio Recordings (Sony/Columbia)
Review by Chris Ingham, Uncut, July 1998
6 CD set of innovative, hugely influential jazz group covering ESP, Miles Smiles, Sorcerer, Nefertiti, Water Babies, Miles In The Sky and Filles De Kilimanjaro ...
Billie 4 Miles: A Kind Of Blue Love
Essay by James Maycock, The Guardian, February 1999
MILES DAVIS CONFESSED twice in his candid autobiography he fancied Billie Holiday. "She had such a sensuous mouth," he remarked, "I thought she was not ...
Charles Mingus' Aces Back to Back and other jazz reissues
Review by Gene Santoro, The Nation, 18 February 1999
FOR THE PAST year and a half, I've been spending most of my time between 1922 and 1979 – the years of Charles Mingus's birth ...
Interview by Fred Schruers, Rolling Stone, 11 November 1999
JOHN COLTRANE, Miles Davis, Thelonious Monk and Charles Mingus were not just virtuoso musicians but path-breaking composers and bandleaders who shaped the sound of modern ...
Miles Davis: Complete Columbia Recordings #3, 1955-'60, with John Coltrane
Review by Clinton Walker, HQ, 2000
IN 1955 WHEN John Coltrane replaced Sonny Rollins in the new quintet Miles Davis was getting together, jazz was at a turning point – and ...
Miles Davis: The Hat Makes the Man
Book Excerpt by Nick Tosches, The Nick Tosches Reader, 2000
THE WORD ITSELF is deadening: art, a devalued dollar of a word, no longer backed by meaning, as drained of worth as the politician's viability, ...
Miles Davis and John Coltrane: The Complete Columbia Recordings 1955-1961
Review by Ian MacDonald, Uncut, August 2000
TIME SASHAYS on and Miles Davis, who was still with us only a few blinks of an eye ago is already becoming history. Hence Sony's ...
Miles Davis: Big Fun; Get Up With It; On The Corner
Review by Ian MacDonald, Uncut, February 2001
CONTROVERSIAL FUSION megastructures from the early Seventies. ...
Miles Davis: Live At The Fillmore East (March 7,1970): It's About That Time (Columbia/Legacy)****
Review by Ian MacDonald, Uncut, November 2001
FIERCE PRE-Bitches Brew live date at a rock venue. ...
Miles Davis: The Complete 'In A Silent Way' Sessions (Columbia/Legacy)****
Review by Ian MacDonald, Uncut, December 2001
Another episode in Columbia's complete reissue programme. ...
The Prince of Darkness: So What: The Life Of Miles Davis by John Szwed (Arrow)
Book Review by Andy Gill, The Word, January 2004
Miles Davis: what demonic spirit possessed him? ...
Comment by John L. Walters, The Guardian, 10 February 2006
Miles Davis wouldn't have wanted his out-takes made public, so why all the box sets? ...
Richard Williams: The Blue Moment (Faber & Faber)
Book Review by David Stubbs, The Wire, August 2009
MILES DAVIS's Kind of Blue is probably the most popular jazz recording of all time, equally so among those who don't own any other jazz ...
The Miles Davis Quintet: Live In Europe 1967
Film/DVD/TV Review by Michael Azerrad, Rock's Backpages, October 2009
LIKE ANY credible person, I dig Miles Davis. But I particularly dig his quintet with saxophonist Wayne Shorter, pianist Herbie Hancock, bassist Ron Carter and ...
Mapping the Sonic Future: Miles Davis' In a Silent Way
Retrospective by Don Snowden, Rock's Backpages, December 2009
IN THE MIDST of all this full-blown industry overkill of the 40th anniversary of this or the expanded deluxe-edition commemorating 25 years of that, one ...
John Lydon, Nick Cave, Wayne Coyne, Iggy & More: My Favourite Miles Davis Album
Guide by John Doran, The Quietus, 5 October 2010
To celebrate the recent reissue of Bitches Brew, John Doran asked Iggy Pop, Jim Sclavunos, Jason Pierce, Mike Patton, Paul Weller and many other musicians ...
Me and Miles Davis, in a silent way
Essay by Mark Mordue, The Australian, 31 December 2011
I DON'T WANT to tell you where. It seems too private. Not that I have all that much to tell, only what I saw. Midafternoon, ...
Memoir by Miles Marshall Lewis, The Fader, 30 June 2017
"How would someone young get turned on to jazz, an art form with its most innovative days behind it?" ...
Richard Russell: Rich Pickings
Interview by Jamie Atkins, Record Collector, March 2018
As Richard Russell's collaborative album, Everything Is Recorded, is released, RC's Jamie Atkins meets him to talk about the recording and the music that led ...
Retrospective by Jon Newey, Jazzwise, September 2020
Fifty years ago this month Miles Davis played the biggest gig of his career when he brought his groundbreaking Bitches Brew band to the 1970 ...
Joni's Jazz-rock and Fusion's Big Bang
Book Excerpt by Ann Powers, 'Traveling' (Dey Street Books), June 2024
Excerpted from Traveling: On the Path of Joni Mitchell © 2024 by Ann Powers. Reprinted by permission of Dey Street Books, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers. ...
see also Betty Davis
see also Gil Evans
see also Herbie Hancock
see also John Scofield
see also Wayne Shorter
see also Jack DeJohnette
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