Miles Davis - Olympia Concerts. Live (1960, 1973) [5CD] {1999 Trema Remaster}

This remarkable concert at the Paris Olympia in March 1960 features the same group(less Cannonball Adderley) that recorded 'Freddie Freeloader' on Miles Davis's classic album 'Kind of Blue' a year or so earlier but they sound very different here. John Coltrane was reluctant to be part of this European tour and was anxious to leave Miles and start his own band. Despite this he's in absolutely blistering form although some members of the audience are clearly perturbed by the intensity of his playing. The recording quality is excellent and it's a mystery why this concert hasn't received more attention.

In March of 1960, Miles Davis was absolutely incensed at John Coltrane. He was about to go on his first ever European tour, and Coltrane was trying to back out. Trane wrote a note requesting that some kid called WAYNE SHORTER should go on the tour as the saxophonist instead of him. Trane was uncharacteristically angry himself, because he felt going on the tour would waste time he needed to put together his own group - the Classic Quartet.

Miles angrily told Coltrane not even to think about backing out - particularly as he had never even heard the name Shorter before. So Coltrane, fuming and sulking, took a plane to France, turning up with a blue suit and a packet of rum flavoured Life Savers. He sulked the whole time he was in Europe, which was not characteristic of him.

On 20 March 1960, the Miles Quintet - temporarily reconsituted with Coltrane, Kelly, Chambers and Jones - appeared at the Olympia, Paris. The CD I am reviewing was the result.

It was one of Coltrane's, and Miles', most notorious appearances. Perhaps fuelled by his uncharacteristic anger, Coltrane's performance is almost contemptuous in its uncompromising ugliness. It's also one of his most inspired performances. His performances would not be so "far-out" again until 1965. "All of You" is bad enough with its passages entirely in multiphonics, its weird altissimo shrills, and its barking honks. But "Bye Bye Blackbird" takes the cake. About midway into Trane's solo, the air begins to fill with the distinct sound of Gallic boos and hisses, and the occasional contemptuous whistle. Coltrane's style had evolved light years beyond what it had been even when he had recorded Kind of Blue the previous year. The Bye Bye Blackbird performance sometimes seems even to ignore bar lines, simply allowing Coltrane to work off his frustrations in repeated, angry motifs, screeches and honks. When the crowd keeps booing, Coltrane seems to falter at first; then in a sonic "big finger" he begins playing even more fiercely, as if deliberately trying to annoy the audience. When his solo ends, it is hard to tell if those are genuine cheers among the shouts of rage, or whether the crowd is simply relieved it's all over.

After the performance Frank Tenot, a French jazz journalist, rushd backstage to find Trane. "Don't you go too far?" he asked in English. Trane smiled gently. "I don't go far enough" he replied.

Strangely enough, when COltrane returnd to Paris in 1962, he chose to perform an 18 minute version of Bye Bye Blackbird, twice as long as the controversial one, and even more far out. This time, though, he is simply cheered by the crowd. Another journalist said: "I am glad there was no booing this time." Coltrane replied: "But there were boos this time too - I heard them!" (And in fact if you listen carefully there is a boo - but it's during the piano solo!)

The Olympia concert of March 1960 is clearly a historically important recording. No fan of Trane or Miles should be without it (and Miles soloes extremely well too, eg on All of You). You cannot get a performance like this on a studio recording - to use a trite phrase, "you had to have been there". Listening to this fierce recording is as close as we can come now to "being there".

On page 249 of the autobiography, Miles recounts driving around Philly with Jimmy Heath, recalling that he "probably was complaining to him about Sonny Stitt playing the wrong [stuff] on 'So What,' because he would always [mess] up on that tune."

The marvel is that Miles called on Sonny to replace Coltrane in the first place. But Wayne Shorter wanted to stay on with Art Blakey, so the most complete and polished bebop player of them all, a saxophonist embodying, but not extending beyond, the previous tradition took the coveted chair. Until these recordings came to light–of a 1960 Paris concert in October (there's an earlier Paris date the same year, only with Coltrane)–it was assumed the Stitt edition of Miles' group had never been recorded.

So now we know what Miles was talking about. Sonny's musical style–about melodic "formulas" and rhythmic/harmonic "closure"–is clearly "wrong" for Miles, but not necessarily for Sonny. On all of the tunes, including the modal "So What," Sonny "locks" into the time, much like a Coleman Hawkins, and plays within the harmonies of the tune, coming back to the tonic note at every opportunity. Miles if anything overplays, as though he's determined to rub Sonny's nose in the new music until he gets it. Sonny will have none of it. He counter-punches with his very best shots, exhausting the melodic/harmonic vocabulary inherited from Bird and Diz. The result is a dazzling display of disparate pyrotechnics–perhaps the last time Miles would play this aggressively on record. For my money, this quintet is more exciting, perhaps even breath-taking, than the Shorter-Hancock-Carter-Williams unit that would soon succeed it.

A few caveats: there's considerable audio distortion, especially of the trumpet. And of course this is not an album for anyone who is just beginning a Miles collection. But for certain saxophonists I know and perhaps careful listeners who are knowledgeable about styles and traditions, this rare album will be an endlessly fascinating if not essential addition to a vital jazz collection.

Of Miles Davis's numerous live releases from the 1970s, this one rates as less essential, but it does provide further insight into the fascinating chronology of Davis' music as he entered the final stages of his pre-retirement "electric period." The band heard here includes drummer Al Foster, electric bassist Michael Henderson, electric guitarists Pete Cosey and Reggie Lucas, percussionist Mtume, and saxophonist Dave Liebman. Several of these players are heard to better effect one year earlier on the more colorful and varied In Concert: Live at Philharmonic Hall recording, which featured material from On the Corner, A Tribute to Jack Johnson, and Get Up With It. By 1973, Davis' music had increasingly focused on mesmerizing static harmonies, electronics, and dense polyrhythmic layers that danced around the core of Foster's surging beats and Henderson's subterranean throb. The themes are noticeably shorter, sometimes only a few notes, and tempo/key changes are less frequent than earlier electric period models. From this cauldron often came solos of considerable potency, even anguish. Dave Liebman plays particularly well here, as does Davis with his wah pedal underfoot. Cosey was a relatively recent addition to this lineup and had yet to unleash the stunning, detuned meltdowns heard shortly hereafter. Instead, his soloing is more spacious and overtly blues-based, while Lucas counters with slices of deep funk. This recording clearly illuminates a path to the material heard – more fully realized and better recorded – on Dark Magus, Agharta, and Pangaea. Unfortunately, the sound quality is erratic; instruments occasionally disappear and the mono mix is inconsistent, although it does eventually settle in. The recording does not reliably capture the dense tapestry of sound and rhythm that this ensemble created. Most of the tracks are incorrectly or haphazardly titled. For instance, the "Ife" listed here bears no resemblance to the studio version heard on Big Fun. Despite these flaws, this recording is certainly recommended for completists, although the above-mentioned recordings offer better representations of this incendiary music.