After I heard Kind of Blue for the first time, it completely changed the way I listened to music.
In Fact, I remember boasting how I hated instrumental music for the most part. I couldn't stand music without vocals.
The problem was, I had not listened to modern jazz before. You see, there's good instrumental music and there's bad instrumental music.
Miles on the other hand really blew my mind, I had no idea the scope of the music he played. I had no concept Miles was as important as he was to contemporary music in the 20th and now 21st Century.
I began paying more attention to detail after I discovered Miles, the nuances of the music, what was in between the notes in some respects.
This awakening would have been in the mid-1990's, and before that, my listening repertoire would have consisted of 80's thrash and glam metal, which I still enjoy from time to time.
The thing about modern jazz, especially the great music like Miles' second great quintet, or the classic John Coltrane Quartet, was how thought provoking it is, the music demands your complete attention. Somehow it remains modern half a century later.
Once Miles went electric, my favorite time period by a hair, I was completely mesmerized by the experimental style, and the uniquely funky sound Miles developed throughout the 70's, up until his lost period.
Maybe I am off base, but the electric period funk style after 1972 was like a new form of music. It will suck you into the groove before you know it, you're looking at the clock wondering how 15 minutes just passed so fast. The music will completely draw you in.
I am pushing 20 years with Miles right now, and I never quit listening, that says a lot. I never get tired of it that's for sure. If you want to study post WWII jazz, just buy everything recorded from Miles Davis from 47-91, you won't need any other musicians to understand the history, really that's not hype either.
Miles worked with practically anyone who was important. He either invented, or was a major innovator in practically every style in post WWII jazz.
Miles' music is also perfect for the iPod playlist generation:
Davis was so innovative, that much of his 70's electric music is just now being understood. With so many genres of jazz, and entirely new music he touched on or helped invent, just about anyone could find something to like.
I eventually became a vinyl record collector because I wanted to own these iconic album covers in the 12 inch format, Miles and the Blue Note Label. Once I realized how much better jazz, especially acoustic jazz sounded on vinyl, I was hooked.
Listen to the opening of "So What" below, from the Iconic masterpiece Kind of Blue: The intro sounds composed, but was an improvised introduction of piano (Bill Evans) and bass (Paul Chambers).
The way the song develops, when Miles' comes in with the trumpet's spoken "So What," man, it's really that good.
For me Miles' music never loses it's freshness, the music reveals new things to me all the time, I hear things I don't remember hearing from years ago, or at least new ways to listen to music in general.
I know it's cliche, but "So What" was indeed the track that I first realized, "man I have missed out on a lot of great music". I do remember vividly that first complete CD listen of Kind of Blue, it was at night in the car in front of a Barnes and Noble circa 1997.
It was a rain soaked foggy night. I am telling you this whole mood and music thing took me in like an enigmatic force I couldn't control. Ordinarily cliches like this I laugh at, but like so many others with Kind of Blue, it happened to me. One of the few times the hype lives up to its reputation. Imagine the mentioned foggy atmosphere then"Blue in Green" comes on?
It still took me a few years to fully aquire the taste for modern jazz, but oh did I do just that. The mixed reviewed Ken Burns Jazz documentary came in 2000, and gave be a very good start with the music... while Burns was not nearly complete in his version of what jazz was, I was introduced to Duke Ellington, John Coltrane, and Wynton Marsalis for better or worse through the series.
The companion CD's and 10 DVDs, were a pretty good start for someone ready to dive head long into the music. Imagine how shocked I was when I heard Bitches Brew or Jack Johnson for the first time? I mean, that music was really in my wheel house, I didn't know Miles went electric like that.
Thankfully Miles' music took hold when it did, I could not imagine my life without him, or jazz.
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