VOTE FOR MILES - ILM artist poll #32, Miles Davis - Results Thread

Recap --

11.	Footprints	304	10	2
12.	On The Corner/New York Girl/Thinkin' of One Thing and Doin' Another/Vote for Miles	283	10	1
13.	Nefertiti	272	10	0
14.	Miles Runs the Voodoo Down	268	9	0
15.	Rated X	264	8	0
16.	Blue In Green	261	9	1
17.	Round Midnight	254	8	1
18.	Seven Steps to Heaven	225	8	0
19.	Flamenco Sketches	225	6	3 
20.	Pharoah's Dance	218	6	1
21.	My Funny Valentine	209	8	0
22.	Boplicity	208	7	0
23.	Freddie Freeloader	198	8	0
24.	Zimbabwe	189	6	1
25.	Bitches Brew	185	7	0
26.	Go Ahead John	184	7	1
27.	Fall	156	5	1
28.	Agitation	154	5	0
29.	Prelude	153	5	0
30.	Frelon Brun	151	6	1
31.	Solea	151	6	0
32.	Mademoiselle Mabry	146	7	0
33.	Yesternow	142	6	0
34.	Filles de Kilimanjaro	140	7	0
35.	It Never Entered My Mind	139	4	0
36.	Someday My Prince Will Come	138	6	0
37.	Tout de Suite	135	5	0
38.	Générique	127	5	0
39.	E.S.P.	114	5	0
40.	Stuff	112	6	0 
41.	Prayer (Oh Doctor Jesus)	112	4	0

It's hard to think of 18 and 19 as anything but a dead heat, 225/6/3 vs 225/8/0, but # of votes is always my first tiebreaker over number of #1s. This next one is even closer. So, here's the top 10!

#10 - "Milestones" (M. Davis) - from Milestones, 1958
304 points, 12 votes, 0 #1 votes
http://youtu.be/BeZomqLM7BQ

That was my #2. I only know it through a Miles/Coltrane best-of. The words that come to mind when I listen to the opening are "light touch."

I cannot believe I forgot to put "Milestones" on my ballot.

Yeah, it's definitely on any Miles' Greatest Hits-type record.

Interesting that it's on a Coltrane comp as well. As u listen to it now, I'd never noticed how in a lot of ways it's more of a Coltrane showcase than a Miles one.

#9 - "Spanish Key" (M. Davis) - from Bitches Brew, 1970
316 points, 12 votes, 0 #1 votes
http://youtu.be/ibanLlREjTk

McLaughlin's playing is so great on this...reminds me of the Sonny Sharrock quote, "I consider myself a saxophonist with a very fucked-up axe."

#8 - "Concierto de Aranjuez (Adagio)" (Joaquín Rodrigo) - from Sketches of Spain, 1960
323 points, 12 votes, 0 #1 votes
http://youtu.be/0kSmLTmS1xI

lovely

The first time "Spanish Key" hits that arrival point (signaled by Zawinul IIRC) is the jazz equivalent of James Brown taking it to the bridge in "Sex Machine."

If I had voted for something on Bitches Brew, it probably would have been 'Spanish Key.'

I believe Sketches of Spain was the first thing I bought by Miles. You could do a lot worse than have that intro to "Concierto de Aranjuez" be your introduction to the guy.

spanish key now will (and should) always be associated with one of the greatest videos ever:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=CXfEiUXuJKc#t=69s

*#23 - "Freddie Freeloader" (M. Davis) - from Kind of Blue, 1959
198 points, 8 votes, 0 #1 votes
http://youtu.be/RPfFhfSuUZ4*

The first time "Spanish Key" hits that arrival point (signaled by Zawinul IIRC) is the jazz equivalent of James Brown taking it to the bridge in "Sex Machine."

OTM. One of my favorite moments in a Miles composition (though my vote was for the live version on It's About That Time, second show).

#7 - "Black Satin" (M. Davis) - from On the Corner, 1972
395 points, 14 votes, 0 #1 votes
http://youtu.be/dbbCZaI313A

sleigh bells + handclaps + whistling
this is just so messed up, in the very best ways

Wow, surprised to that this high.

I mean, I voted for it, but still, not THAT high. . .

Agreed -- I was feeling little grumpy about OTC when I filled out my ballot, but if anything was going to make it would've been this one. Still, this is really, really high.

#6 - "He Loved Him Madly" (M. Davis) - from Get Up With It, 1974
447 points, 13 votes, one #1 vote
The song in a 4-video playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5A5BBEC4620E23F4

Wow

I love that there are a few surprises in the top 10!

That was my number one. I could listen to "He loved him madly" on a loop all day and never get bored with it.

Get Up With It was one of my many Miles blind spots going into the poll. Didn't have time to absorb it sufficiently to feel like I could vote for anything on it, but I already regret not voting for "HLHM." That album and Big Fun are the two I most look forward to getting to know.

I was bored silly by HLHM the first time I heard it, wondering when they were gonna get to the fireworks factory. Now it's one of my favorites.

#5 - "All Blues" (M. Davis) - from Kind of Blue, 1959
505 points, 16 votes, 0 #1 votes
http://youtu.be/JIfdYs8WErM

He Loved Him Madly is very beautiful. What's the title about?

It's Miles' tribute to Duke Ellington, who had died about a month earlier. Duke ended his concerts by telling the audience "We love you madly."

i think it's a reference to the duke ellington (who had died around the time of the release of Get Up With It)song "Love You Madly", right?

sorry, xpost

"All Blues" was my #2. My favorite on KoB by a fair distance (tho I'm not surprised "So What" will top it in the poll). I love the simmer of it.

Evans provides great support in "All Blues," but leaves the inventive leaping-over-a-tall-building to the horns, especially Coltrane.

Well, the top 4 seem pretty obvious at this point -- just a question of order.

#4 - "Right Off" (M. Davis) - from A Tribute to Jack Johnson, 1971
529 points, 15 votes, one #1 vote
http://youtu.be/D_w3-Bx9rnI

Tipsy, was this one of your 4?

Despite its pedigree, "He Loved Him Madly" has always left me a little cold. Which makes me think...

Who are the best critical voices of Miles' electric music? I don't mean Stanley Crouch, etc., but someone who intelligently criticizes it? At this point, this period has been so critically resurrected. And not to disrespect the good work folks like Phil and Paul Tingen have done bringing to light aspects of the era that went under appreciated for so long, but it's difficult to actually find much quality writing that judges it poorly using contemporary criteria.

The only ones who come to mind are Ian MacDonald, who wrote a good piece on 70s reissues in Uncut before shuffling from this mortal coil -- he was particularly hard on Macero.

Also, the Jack Chambers bio(s) (which I read in college when these records were impossible to find) has its place -- tho there's a bit of the "this music insults the intellect of the people" criticisms that followed Miles 70s output around in the press until the 90s. The funny thing is that the first volume, which covers the early years, talks glowingly about his electric music in the context of the 60s music. But when he actually writes about the electric years in the second volume, he is often pretty unforgiving.

Still, Chambers made some decent points -- that the length of some of these cuts is a problem (Big Fun in particular -- but also in places on Bitches Brew), that the brutalist approach to editing doesn't always serve the music very well, and so on.

Any others come to mind?

Recalling now that when I saw Spiritualized on the Pure Phase tour, they played the entirety of He Loved Him Madly over the PA before taking the stage. Seemed appropriate.

Except Jason Spaceman thought it was about him.

Any others come to mind?

Didn't Lester Bangs have a back-and-forth with himself about the merits of On The Corner? It's been years since I read those pieces, so I might be misremembering.

Any others come to mind?

I'm drawing a blank, but I'm way, way out of the critical loop.

Tipsy, was this one of your 4?

Yup. Given the placement in the albums poll, I figured.

#3 - "So What" (M. Davis) - from Kind of Blue, 1959
543 points, 18 votes, two #1 votes
http://youtu.be/DEC8nqT6Rrk

Now THAT is shocking.

That's why I love these polls.

Re. "Right Off," not enough love, in the midst of the jazz v rock debate, for how unbelievably powerful the opening to this is. IIRC, it's an edit, but holy god is it a good one if so. Whether Cobham is swinging or not, he's absolutely pounding the shit out of the skins in this -- and McLaughlin, lets just say, isn't duetting with Doc Severinsen. Combined with Henderson missing the key change and Miles (inverting the Herbie "make it work" approach I mentioned upthread) entering in dramatic fashion, "Right Off" is pretty potent stuff.

I didn't vote for it. Nice riff, but he has better tunes imo.

'Right Off' does kick butt and take names, for sure. Have you heard the box set, NTI?

RE: 'So What'
I purposely put it out of my top ten because I thought it would be a sure thing at number one.

"So What" is like the "Yesterday" of jazz -- the one tune that everyone knows regardless of whether they know or even care for the genre (or music for that matter). Overplayed or not, it's pretty much perfect.

I have the JJ box -- the only one, I think, that actually delivers on the promise of being the *complete* sessions. It's rougher sledding as a result, but more useful in an academic sense. Which at the end of the day, these boxes are.

So basically this will be the first poll where the album and track winners are identical.

Just wondering, because, using the stuff on that box set, it would be possible (and fun, depending on how nerdy one is) to try and recreate 'Right Off' the way it appeared on the proper album.