Album of the day (#3633): In A Silent Way by Miles Davis - Music

albummaster

Janitor

Gender: Male

Location: Spain

Site Admin

Today's album of the day

In A Silent Way by Miles Davis (View album | Buy this album)

Year: 1969.
Country:

Overall rank: 227
Average rating: 86/100 (from 734 votes).

Thumbnail. Click to enlarge.

Tracks:
1. Shhh/Peaceful
2. In A Silent Way/It's About That Time

About album of the day: The BestEverAlbums.com album of the day is the album appearing most prominently in member charts in the previous 24 hours. If an album, or artist, has previously been selected within a x day period, the next highest album is picked instead (and so on) to ensure a bit of variety. A full history of album of the day can be viewed here.

HoldenM

To Pedantically Split Infinitives

Gender: Male

Age: 29

My favorite Miles Davis.

Track pick
1. Shhh/Peaceful
_________________
Inversion Verses
https://thesplitinfinitives1.bandcamp.c...ion-verses

Mercury

Turn your back on the pay-you-back last call

Gender: Male

Location: St. Louis

Stunning album. Brilliant beyond words.
_________________
-Ryan

ONLY 4% of people can understand this chart! Come try!

My Fave Metal - you won't believe #5!!!

DommeDamian

Imperfect, sensitive Aspie with a melody addiction

Gender: Male

Age: 23

Location: where the flowers grow.

one of my favorite jazz albums!
_________________
My Top 100 :
www.besteveralbums.com/thechart.php?c=4...amp;page=1

My music:
- www.hyperfollow.com/dommedamian
Spotify: ----------------------------------------------------↓

RoundTheBend

I miss the comfort in being sad

Location: Ground Control

Possibly one of the best stretches of anyone's career.
1969 - In a Silent Way
1970- Bitches Brew
1971 -A Tribute to Jack Johnson [film score]
1972- On the Corner
1974 -Get Up With It

Now Admittedly the next one I listened to was 1967's Miles Smiles, which was a bit back and I don't remember what I thought of it to be honest.

Anyone have comments on Sorcerer, Nefertiti, and Filles de Kilimanjaro?

DommeDamian

Imperfect, sensitive Aspie with a melody addiction

Gender: Male

Age: 23

Location: where the flowers grow.

RoundTheBend wrote:

Possibly one of the best stretches of anyone's career.
1969 - In a Silent Way
1970- Bitches Brew
1971 -A Tribute to Jack Johnson [film score]
1972- On the Corner
1974 -Get Up With It

Now Admittedly the next one I listened to was 1967's Miles Smiles, which was a bit back and I don't remember what I thought of it to be honest.

Anyone have comments on Sorcerer, Nefertiti, and Filles de Kilimanjaro?

Agree with the stretch, perhaps the best in jazz IMO.
And no, no comments.
_________________
My Top 100 :
www.besteveralbums.com/thechart.php?c=4...amp;page=1

My music:
- www.hyperfollow.com/dommedamian
Spotify: ----------------------------------------------------↓

Fischman

RockMonster, JazzMeister, Bluesboy,ClassicalMaster

Gender: Male

Location: Land of Enchantment

RoundTheBend wrote:

Possibly one of the best stretches of anyone's career.
1969 - In a Silent Way
1970- Bitches Brew
1971 -A Tribute to Jack Johnson [film score]
1972- On the Corner
1974 -Get Up With It

Now Admittedly the next one I listened to was 1967's Miles Smiles, which was a bit back and I don't remember what I thought of it to be honest.

Anyone have comments on Sorcerer, Nefertiti, and Filles de Kilimanjaro?

I would easily include those three In that stretch.

To elaborate, the following is pulled from my diary entry for Nefertiti and Sorcerer:

These albums seem to be transitional; while still purely acoustic, they show the beginnings of the electric attitude that would have Miles exploding into fusion in a couple years. When I fist picked up "Sorcerer," I saw the first song title, "Prince of Darkness," and thought "Wha... do I file this with my Ozzy Osborne albums?" Irrelevant coincidences aside, what a great tune! What I really love about it is that it is, ironically, anything but dark, especially by brooding Miles' standards. Tony Williams' drumming shimmers and shines while Miles gives us some of the most upbeat playing of his career. Not necessarily technical crazy upbeat in the sense of a Morgan or Hubbard, but just lively, flowing, joyful trumpet that sits so ideally with Williams' groove. Interestingly, Miles himself really shines on "Prince of Darkness," a Wayne Shorter tune, but then Shorter shines on the following tune, "Pee Wee," which was penned by drummer Williams! It is serious but sweet ballad that sequences nicely after "Prince." The title cut proves to be another excellent highlight, being a forward leaning composition with dynamic interplay between Davis and Shorter, and once again propelled by Williams' totally off the hook drumming. "Limbo" is like two songs in one with an extended Herbie Hancock piano solo intro followed by the ensemble nailing some very clever modal post-bop. Miles himself carries the balladeering melody on "Vonetta," which is nice, but like much Miles, a little sedate for my taste. Nevertheless, through this point, the album as a whole is stellar and as great as the parts are, the whole remains greater than the sum. The afterthought "Nothing Like You," recorded a few years prior, need not have been tossed on at the end here. Not only is it not a good vocal (and that's putting it nicely), it feels completely out of place on the album. Had this album been 38 minutes rather than 40, it would be near perfect.

"Nefertiti," which would be Miles' last purely acoustic album, retains the same great quintet as "Sorcerer," and actually sheds a little of the electric attitude displayed on the earlier album. That's not to say it wasn't moving forward however. The title track is interesting in that the horns repeat their melody without improvising while the rhythm section improvises underneath the horn melody. Who but Miles would have dared do such a thing? Of course, having Ron Carter and Tony Williams in the rhythm section means you know you can get away with such a thing. It's fascinating to hear Williams do his thing while the traditional melody instruments maintain the foundation. It's a drum solo for people who don't like drum solos! The rest of the album is a blend of typically Milesian more-cool-than-hot moderate tempo and ballad pieces, all of which are worth a listen, with "Hand Jive" and "Madness" standing out as intriguing faster songs and "Fall" captivating as a ballad. Hancock is indispensable throughout.

I've generally thought of Nefertiti as the greater of these two albums, but after this most recent listen, I'm actually leaning toward Sorcerer... just so long as I lift the needle before the last cut.

LedZep

Nefertiti is top 3 of Miles to me. A truly underrated album in his vast catalogue. Sorcerer is good too, but it always felt to me like a budget counterpart to Nefertiti. Like Fischman said, it's the same players doing the similar style, but less adventurous and less refined.

Quote:

The title track is interesting in that the horns repeat their melody without improvising while the rhythm section improvises underneath the horn melody. Who but Miles would have dared do such a thing? Of course, having Ron Carter and Tony Williams in the rhythm section means you know you can get away with such a thing. It's fascinating to hear Williams do his thing while the traditional melody instruments maintain the foundation. It's a drum solo for people who don't like drum solos!

There isn't a song on Sorcerer that does this for example. Song to song comparison easily goes Nefertiti's way imo. Haven't heard Filles de Kilimanjaro in forever, so I can't comment on it right now, but I do remember liking it a lot.

As for In A Silent Way, it always seemed to me that every "serious" Miles fan considers it his best work. Which makes me question why it's not one of my favourite Miles albums. I mean it is, but not like top 3. And every time I hype myself and put it on it's the same reaction as the last time. Brilliant piece of work, but not one of those albums that completely floor me. Especially strange considering my love of ambient, sounds-based music.
_________________
Finally updated the overall chart

2020s
90s

EyeKanFly

Head Bear Master/Galactic Emperor

Age: 33

Location: Gotham

It's been a long time since I listened to Nefertiti but I recall loving it. Will need to give it another spin.

In a Silent Way has grown on me the more I listen to it, unlike Bitches Brew which has soured on me over the years. I do think it's hard to compare those 3 to some of Miles' earlier work, it was mentioned that his 1969-1974 streak was an amazing streak of albums, I think the same could be argued for 57-61 ('Round About Midnight thru Someday My Prince Will Come), in particular his Columbia albums, though his Prestige/Blue Note albums from that era also astound.

Since we had a fairly lengthy discussion about Beck and Odelay over the past week, one thing that I think was said about Beck applies even more so to Miles Davis: genre-hopping. While Miles' music is mostly "jazz" his journey from bebop > cool jazz > hard bop > third stream > modal jazz > post-bop > jazz fusion > funk is astounding (with a few other genres like big band and swing thrown in the mix). I often forget how much variety there is within jazz since I'm typically in a rock mindset. In some ways jazz has even more variety than rock. While rock is typically a guitar-bass guitar-drums trio, with piano/keyboard and sometimes strings thrown in, the variety of instruments used in jazz is significantly greater, and Miles' career makes this clear despite him playing mostly trumpet and piano over the course of his career.

Well, time to revisit both Nefertiti and In a Silent Way, and maybe move on to the rest of Miles' catalog, particularly albums like Sorcerer which I don't believe I've listened to yet.
_________________
51 Washington, D.C. albums!

RoundTheBend

I miss the comfort in being sad

Location: Ground Control

good stuff - thanks for the comments.

And yeah - genre jumping indeed. Probably unfair to say, but miles' playing itself isn't radically different. Is it different, for sure. But really it's the rest of the band that provides this.

Anyone have any ideas on the control he had over the process? Like was he saying, yeah, I want to make an ambient album, or was it closer to he hired people who happened to "jam" out this feel? Or what?