Thursday, April 12, 2018

#12 Miles Davis' "Birth of the Cool"

I generally don't like jazz. That being said, I saw Don Cheadle's movie, "Miles Away," really enjoyed it and then dialed up "Kind of Blue," pretty much THE Miles Davis album everyone agrees you're supposed to listen to and... liked it. It's not on my everyday playlist or anything but I could accept it and get it, to some degree which I couldn't before. That being said, "Birth of the Cool" is not "Kind of Blue." This doesn't mean I think it's bad, more that it's early and we haven't got to THAT Miles yet. This album, which is partially a product of its time, is full of rather short pieces which feel like they would really rather be drawn out and explored a lot further. The version of the album on iTunes is missing the last track mentioned in the book, "Darn That Dream," and I wish it had been missing. It has terrible vocals which, to my ear, clash with everything else on the album. That being said, this is a perfectly good, smokey, nightclubby album. To me, it was more a taste than a full meal. "Kind of Blue" apparently comes up later on in the list. I look forward to listening to that again.

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