The Electric Miles DVD is probably the best Miles doc. There's one called The Miles Davis Story which is decidedly hit-or-miss. Mostly miss.
There was also a PBS special on Miles. I can't remember if it was Great Performances or American Masters, but it was made around 1986 or so, and while generally well-made, is has way too much contemporary footage of his digital-synth-drenched band and its worthless, mugging guitarist.
― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Saturday, 10 October 2015 16:55 (eight years ago) link
i love when bill boggs calls sketches of spain proto-new age music.
― scott seward, Saturday, 10 October 2015 16:58 (eight years ago) link
hahaha..."waitaminute...what did you say Sketches of Spain was?!"
― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Saturday, 10 October 2015 17:03 (eight years ago) link
miles' voice really did sound like that
the issue for me so far in that clip is just that don cheadle's presence just has a hesitant insecurity that is very un-Miles
― Listen to my homeboy Fantano (D-40), Saturday, 10 October 2015 17:17 (eight years ago) link
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/review/don-cheadles-miles-davis-biopic-831212
― Listen to my homeboy Fantano (D-40), Sunday, 11 October 2015 22:35 (eight years ago) link
John Coltraine
― austinato (Austin), Sunday, 11 October 2015 23:01 (eight years ago) link
Yeah what d-40 said
― on entre O.K. on sort K.O. (man alive), Monday, 12 October 2015 01:19 (eight years ago) link
New trailer! And it looks...not particularly good! Gonna go see it anyway.
http://www.ew.com/article/2016/02/02/don-cheadle-miles-davis-miles-ahead-trailer
― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Tuesday, 2 February 2016 19:35 (eight years ago) link
lol Miles sure shot a lot of people
― Οὖτις, Tuesday, 2 February 2016 19:40 (eight years ago) link
I've read his autobio maybe 10 times, and I can't recall a single instance of him saying he shot someone (or even at anyone...not even Steve Miller).
― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Tuesday, 2 February 2016 19:43 (eight years ago) link
"miles the gangster" lol
― marcos, Tuesday, 2 February 2016 20:09 (eight years ago) link
this looks....... really bad, sorry don cheadle
― marcos, Tuesday, 2 February 2016 20:10 (eight years ago) link
― Listen to my homeboy Fantano (D-40), Saturday, October 10, 2015 1:17 PM (3 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
yea very much so
I'd much rather see Cheadle play temporarily retired Miles at a "low point" in his life for a whole movie than the standard "Down-and-out late-70s Miles looks at a trumpet--cut to a young Miles Davis in East St. Louis seeing a trumpet for the first time"
― intheblanks, Saturday, October 10, 2015 1:30 AM (3 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
lol this movie looks like it somehow manages to accomplish both
― nomar, Tuesday, 2 February 2016 20:17 (eight years ago) link
this looks like a rainier wolfcastle version of the miles davis story.
― nomar, Tuesday, 2 February 2016 20:18 (eight years ago) link
so this... was pretty daft. thought Don Cheadle was actually okay in this. ewan mcgregor was truly awful.
― TARANTINO! (dog latin), Wednesday, 4 May 2016 22:44 (eight years ago) link
Yeah, I lost all interest after watching the trailer.
― Austin, Thursday, 5 May 2016 00:03 (eight years ago) link
Music biopics are generally awful. Do we have a thread about them?
― TARANTINO! (dog latin), Thursday, 5 May 2016 08:15 (eight years ago) link
Anti-Miles memories from the founder of JazzFM (not a recommendation from this UK listener). Interesting because from my limited contact w. the British JazzSNOB world a not untypical mindset of the way jazz appreciation developed here, and the anecdote at the end is p funny despite the author:
https://12barblog.com/category/miles-davis/
― Foster Twelvetrees (Ward Fowler), Wednesday, 22 June 2016 20:12 (seven years ago) link
ok lol classic Miles anecdote
― Οὖτις, Wednesday, 22 June 2016 20:24 (seven years ago) link
lol
― Hi! I'm twice-coloured! (Sund4r), Wednesday, 22 June 2016 20:32 (seven years ago) link
haha the author is such a prick way 2 go miles
― Steve Gunn Mann-Dude (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Wednesday, 22 June 2016 20:35 (seven years ago) link
heh, miles otm
― an alternate version of his real world dog (bizarro gazzara), Wednesday, 22 June 2016 20:55 (seven years ago) link
Yeah, striking intuitive perception on miles part there.
― socka flocka-jones (man alive), Thursday, 23 June 2016 00:11 (seven years ago) link
Hahaha. I got as far as 'famous comedian Bill Oddie' and wanted to kill everyone. Miles otm.
― Sunn O))) Brother Where Art Thou? (Chinaski), Thursday, 23 June 2016 08:20 (seven years ago) link
Bill Oddie:You won't believe the musical pretensions that went on in my head. I listened to a lot of jazz and a lot of funk, and that period of the '70s for me was fantastic - it was really the era when fusion started. The people I liked were Sly Stone and early Parliament, and I listened to what was happening in jazz at the time, when Miles Davis was coming up with some very interesting hybrid music. With 'Funky Gibbon', I started off - it's almost unbelievable considering how stupid the song is - trying to get the feel of a Miles Davis track, I can't remember which, probably just after Bitches Brew and that sort of era: some really choppy Miles Davis-type rhythm, again with a Sly Stone influence.http://www.alwynwturner.com/glitter/funky_gibbon.html
― mahb, Thursday, 23 June 2016 08:27 (seven years ago) link
what in the ever lovin fuck
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iAmx_XdQky8
― Οὖτις, Thursday, 23 June 2016 16:00 (seven years ago) link
forget it shakey its britishtown
― an alternate version of his real world dog (bizarro gazzara), Thursday, 23 June 2016 17:13 (seven years ago) link
That was like a nakh afl post filtered through Garrison Keilor.
― socka flocka-jones (man alive), Thursday, 23 June 2016 18:16 (seven years ago) link
RE: Funky Gibbon - "You know, for kids". One of the first singles I ever owned. Growing up in the 1970s, the Goodies were definitely a gateway for kids into Monty Python. Oddie was one of the regulars on the proto-Python radio series I'm Sorry I'll Read That Again at the same time that Derek Bailey was in the house band.
Oddie was also a regular customer when I worked in the jazz dept of a massive chain record shop, and absolutely no trouble at all. This is him answering questions on 'American Jazz' on Celebrity Mastermind
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyTD4j1Wcso
― Foster Twelvetrees (Ward Fowler), Thursday, 23 June 2016 19:53 (seven years ago) link
American here who loves Miles and loved The Goodies as a kid when it aired on NYC Public Television. So Oddie's cool with me.
Love the Miles anecdote but I feel bad for Red Rodney going thru all that trouble lol.
― Acid Hose (Capitaine Jay Vee), Friday, 24 June 2016 01:56 (seven years ago) link
To the jazz cognoscenti, Miles Davis’s peak playing years were when he was playing with Charlie Parker right up to when he made the series of recordings collated under the title “Birth of the Cool”.
Peak snobbery.
― Austin, Friday, 24 June 2016 03:22 (seven years ago) link
Peak dumbassery really, I don't think anyone thinks that and it mostly suggests he hasn't heard the records MD made with Parker etc or can't hear the frequent mistakes Davis makes on them. It's good, just super embryonic type stuff. Which I thought was a p much universally held opinion. I don't remember his playing being as tentative on BOTC but that's obv way more of an ensemble thing. Anyway there're pre-fusion periods one could make an argument like that for, but choosing that one seems kinda random/uninformed.
― albvivertine, Friday, 24 June 2016 07:27 (seven years ago) link
I honestly can't tell if this sentence is satire or just ignorance: "the very exclusive Getzen company in Wisconsin, who make only the finest hand crafted trumpets"
Getzen horns are not exclusive in the slightest and are basically middle of the road as far as being considered "fine"
― MrExplorer, Friday, 24 June 2016 09:49 (seven years ago) link
― Naive Teen Idol, Friday, 24 June 2016 12:40 (seven years ago) link
yeah I've actually never heard ANYONE suggest that his peak playing was with Parker or BOTC. Not only is it the standard wisdom on him that he was never a "player's player," but his concepts really weren't well-formed yet when he played with Parker.
― socka flocka-jones (man alive), Friday, 24 June 2016 14:01 (seven years ago) link
I mean I thought even straight-ahead curmudgeons preferred the Riverside/early Columbia era.
sry meant to say Prestige
― socka flocka-jones (man alive), Friday, 24 June 2016 14:02 (seven years ago) link
― Austin, Thursday, June 23, 2016 11:22 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
lol yea it took some effort for me to read past that first line, i was just like "wha?????"
― marcos, Friday, 24 June 2016 14:12 (seven years ago) link
like what jazz cognoscenti
second great quintet pretty universally adored too right
wasn't that era wynton marsalis's greatest inspiration
― marcos, Friday, 24 June 2016 14:14 (seven years ago) link
It seems like in the last 10-15 years even most people who hated the electric period either died or went into hiding. But I've literally never heard anyone suggest that he peaked at BOTC.
― socka flocka-jones (man alive), Friday, 24 June 2016 14:45 (seven years ago) link
The Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool documentary on BBC2 tonight. A++
― Psychedics with Rosie Swash (Noodle Vague), Saturday, 14 March 2020 22:45 (four years ago) link
Also now on Netflix in North America btw.
― everything, Sunday, 15 March 2020 00:51 (four years ago) link
yes it was good. horrific stuff with his wife. i didn't realise she was going to be in the west side story movie.
made me want to hang out with lenny white. 'and it just moved, like an amoeba... every now and again something sticking out, just all moving along together'
― Li'l Brexit (Tracer Hand), Sunday, 15 March 2020 01:37 (four years ago) link
I ffwd through most of this tbh
― Οὖτις, Sunday, 15 March 2020 01:43 (four years ago) link
not much there that was new but i ate up actually seeing everyone tell those stories.
― Li'l Brexit (Tracer Hand), Sunday, 15 March 2020 01:46 (four years ago) link
Missed this, but may still be on PBS.org and/or re-broadcast for fundraisers etc.:
American Masters, starting Tues.:Discover the man behind the legend. With full access to the Miles Davis Estate, the film features never-before-seen footage, including studio outtakes from his recording sessions, rare photos and new interviews.https://aptv.org/schedule/detail.php?epid=2378952
― dow, Saturday, February 22, 2020
― dow, Sunday, 15 March 2020 02:00 (four years ago) link
This was pretty boilerplate but a fun watch. The “never-before-seen/heard” stuff wasn’t a big deal imo. Like abt 98% of music docs, I just wished it had more actual uninterrupted music and performance.
― turn the jawhatthefuckever on (One Eye Open), Sunday, 15 March 2020 03:58 (four years ago) link
Yup
― Οὖτις, Sunday, 15 March 2020 04:02 (four years ago) link