I've often wondered what Miles' career would have been had he lived 10 or 15 years longer. He was starting a new hip-hop "era" in his music with Doo Bop and it woulda been interesting to see this develop further on in the 90's.

After that, I see 2 possible evolutions in his career. For one thing, after a few hip-hop records, Miles would probably have been much interested in electronic music, which was the most experimental scene of the 90's. Bill Laswell reported that the 2 considered working together in the 80's and I wouldn't be surprised if Miles would have gone to him for production in the late 90's. Laswell's output in the 90's and early 2000's was a fascinating overprolific mix of every possible genres with a strong emphasis on electronica, Indian, Arabic and Subsaharian musics, dub and ambient (but virtually every genre was touched, from classical to Irish and Chinese folk musics to jazz, funk, metal and hip-hop). Some of Laswell's records brilliantly mixed drum and bass with jazz and Indian classical music and Miles could have experimented with these genres and possibly gone thru another experimental phase that could have rivaled his late 60's/early 70's period. I'm quite sure, due to his interest in "street music" that he'd have been quite interested in drum and bass, which offered a very interesting rythmic complexity.

Another option would have been Miles to -finally- do something with Prince. Had his relationship with WB soured (which could have been the case given that WB antagonized both Prince and Chaka at the time, due to a change in management), I wouldn't have been surprised to see 1998's Newpower Pak (Prince, Chaka and Larry were all ex WB artists) augmented with a fourth album by Miles Davis. This could have been the peak of his rap/R&B period before a possible move towards electronic music. It would also have given much more visibility and credibility to the whole project, which was unfortunately ignored by music critics at the time.

Of course all this is pure speculation but no matter what the directions might have been I'm quite convinced that Miles would have produced very interesting things. I for one was never really convinced by his 80's "synth" output, save maybe the brilliant Aura: Miles used very generic synth and sounds back then and his output, though interesting at times, wasn't really remarkable by comparison to what Herbie Hancock or Toshinori Kondo (2 other jazzmen who embraced synthesizers, drum machines and the 80's sound) were doing at the time, and even Prince had reportedly lost interest in working with Miles by 1989 (according to Eric Leeds or maybe Alan I forgot, it's in their The Last Miles interviews) because he found Miles' musical choices to be disappointing (and they were by comparison to what P was doing, including his jazz stuff as Madhouse), but Doo Bop -though not so popular- is a fave of mine, a very fresh record that really counts among the coolest acid-jaz/hip-hop releases of the early 90's if you ask me, and I'm quite confident that Miles would have been a very interesting creator again.

Opinions and speculations?

Doobop was quite okay, but I can't see him continuing to do the same type of stuff for very long. Before his death he did that performance with a large ensemble in Montreux and performed all that old stuff he did with Gil Evans. I think it's possible that he would have dropped the electronics after several records and banked on live performances with acoustic ensembles. That was the other strong branch of "commercial jazz" in the 90s along with the fusion styles - the return to the roots. Everyone was doing that again by the mid-90s.

Yeah, Laswell could have worked out. Unfortunately, Miles didn't really do the "coolest possible" type of jazz-fusion in the 80s with Marcus Miller and it might have been the case that he would have done even dumber shit (pardon me that expression, but some of Miles' 80s output sounds so dated now that it's almost unlisteneable). With someone like Laswell, yeah, it could have worked out. I have other names like John Zorn in my mind, but don't know how realistic a collaboration with that type of names would have been.

I didn't know that it was Prince that wanted to stop working with him. Kind of interesting and he probably made the right choice. For that matter, I don't think the track they did together around SOTT / Tutu really worked as a collaboration either. On that one, Miles is playing in a manner that doesn't work at all with Prince's music. For Prince, the trumpet is not really a solo instrument, and the parts are usually played higher up and they're more about augmenting hits and so on. Miles kept playing in a register where you'd usually expect the vocals to be in a pop / funk song.

Had they continued to work together they sure would have needed to put some thought into what they're really going to do on record. I'm sure Miles would have found people that it would have been more natural for him to collaborate with than Prince.

novabrkr said:

Doobop was quite okay, but I can't see him continuing to do the same type of stuff for very long. Before his death he did that performance with a large ensemble in Montreux and performed all that old stuff he did with Gil Evans. I think it's possible that he would have dropped the electronics after several records and banked on live performances with acoustic ensembles. That was the other strong branch of "commercial jazz" in the 90s along with the fusion styles - the return to the roots. Everyone was doing that again by the mid-90s.

Yeah, Laswell could have worked out. Unfortunately, Miles didn't really do the "coolest possible" type of jazz-fusion in the 80s with Marcus Miller and it might have been the case that he would have done even dumber shit (pardon me that expression, but some of Miles' 80s output sounds so dated now that it's almost unlisteneable). With someone like Laswell, yeah, it could have worked out. I have other names like John Zorn in my mind, but don't know how realistic a collaboration with that type of names would have been.

I didn't know that it was Prince that wanted to stop working with him. Kind of interesting and he probably made the right choice. For that matter, I don't think the track they did together around SOTT / Tutu really worked as a collaboration either. On that one, Miles is playing in a manner that doesn't work at all with Prince's music. For Prince, the trumpet is not really a solo instrument, and the parts are usually played higher up and they're more about augmenting hits and so on. Miles kept playing in a register where you'd usually expect the vocals to be in a pop / funk song.

Had they continued to work together they sure would have needed to put some thought into what they're really going to do on record. I'm sure Miles would have found people that it would have been more natural for him to collaborate with than Prince.

That went through my head. Might've been a bit of a dismal spectacle, though: Miles going all 'tasteful'. I like to think it would have leveled out in a way more like, say, Joe Zawinul's contemporary setup (in the performance clips in the doc below): i.e. still with an electronic element to the sound, but more subdued (and, for my money, more listenable) than the headiest days of 'fusion'.

I should clarify that I don't think Marcus Miller was "to blame" for the quality of Miles' records during the 80s. Obviously, he worked with many other names and Miller wasn't even involved on, what I personally consider, Miles' worst "sellout" record, "You're Under Arrest".

Most of his 80s records are okay, it's not like the other "big names" in jazz were making too many classic albums in the 80s either.

Yeah the 80's wasn't a great decade for the jazz scene, I'm not sure why actually.

I'm quite convinced that Miles' hip-hop period would have lasted quite a few years/albums: usually his "phases" were quite long up to that point.

I had completely forgotten that Quincy Jones collaboration. It was a very surprising thing and I really wonder how Jones (or whoever was behind this) managed to talk Miles into doing it (Miles was openly reluctant to revisit his classic material). The idea that Miles could have gone thru a "neo-classical" period is interesting and a definitive option I hadn't considered. This being said, while there could maybe have been more per4mances like this one, I don't really see Miles recording studio albums of this kind, but who knows indeed... I have to listen to that soundtrack he did for Dingo in 91, too, I have no idea how it sounds and it may give some indications.

I'm also quite convinced that Doo Bop would have met a much warmer reception if Miles had lived to defend it and tour the project with a new band, and it would have encouraged him to go on in that direction. Look at how Jazzmatazz, Brooklyn Funk Essentials' first album and Marsalis' Buckshot LeFonque project were critically acclaimed. I think the reason why the reception was so lukewarm is that there was a lotsa suspiscion towards the record, I remember many people assumed it wouldn't have sounded like that at all if Miles had lived to finish it. I tend to believe the opposite since most of the material was already finished before he died.

deebee said:

novabrkr said:

Doobop was quite okay, but I can't see him continuing to do the same type of stuff for very long. Before his death he did that performance with a large ensemble in Montreux and performed all that old stuff he did with Gil Evans. I think it's possible that he would have dropped the electronics after several records and banked on live performances with acoustic ensembles. That was the other strong branch of "commercial jazz" in the 90s along with the fusion styles - the return to the roots. Everyone was doing that again by the mid-90s.

Yeah, Laswell could have worked out. Unfortunately, Miles didn't really do the "coolest possible" type of jazz-fusion in the 80s with Marcus Miller and it might have been the case that he would have done even dumber shit (pardon me that expression, but some of Miles' 80s output sounds so dated now that it's almost unlisteneable). With someone like Laswell, yeah, it could have worked out. I have other names like John Zorn in my mind, but don't know how realistic a collaboration with that type of names would have been.

I didn't know that it was Prince that wanted to stop working with him. Kind of interesting and he probably made the right choice. For that matter, I don't think the track they did together around SOTT / Tutu really worked as a collaboration either. On that one, Miles is playing in a manner that doesn't work at all with Prince's music. For Prince, the trumpet is not really a solo instrument, and the parts are usually played higher up and they're more about augmenting hits and so on. Miles kept playing in a register where you'd usually expect the vocals to be in a pop / funk song.

Had they continued to work together they sure would have needed to put some thought into what they're really going to do on record. I'm sure Miles would have found people that it would have been more natural for him to collaborate with than Prince.

That went through my head. Might've been a bit of a dismal spectacle, though: Miles going all 'tasteful'. I like to think it would have leveled out in a way more like, say, Joe Zawinul's contemporary setup (in the performance clips in the doc below): i.e. still with an electronic element to the sound, but more subdued (and, for my money, more listenable) than the headiest days of 'fusion'.

Can I Play With U? really isn't so great but Sticky Wicked gives a good idea of the direction they could have taken (electrojazzfunk). To complete what I was saying above Prince reportedly was embarrassed by Miles' recent music and the fact that Miles asked him to give him a new version of NC2U after Sinead made a hit of it, a request which P found quite corny (he asked Eric to record that version, as he didn't want to have anything to do with it), and Prince obviously didn't feel comfortable at the idea of being bossy with Miles since Miles was a living legend, and he feared Miles would want to do crap and he wouldn't be in a position to either say no or do it. That + the fact that P is notorious for not being at ease doing studio work with people save his own crew, he will usually send tapes, work back on them, send them again, etc. I know some tracks from the 24 sessions were sent to Miles and played live by him after P dropped the first 24 configuration. It's quite interesting that P would send Miles tracks he didn't feel were good enough for Madhouse

I'm listening to Dingo and for one thing I'm so amused because it has the lines "Did u like the music/ It's the best thing I ever heard" which were sampled on my fave track of a wonderful album by Japanese artist Chara a few years later, and I had no idea it was coming from there

It's VERY classical jazz (great shit, though), so yeah there definitely may have been a "neo-classical" era in parallel to the hip-hop sound. It's funny because these 2 albums (Dingo and Montreux) make an odd parenthesis in Miles' music between Amandla and Doo Bop. Now I need to listen to the OST of Siesta from 87 to see if it was already classic jazz or in the mood of the 80's era

novabrkr said:

Doobop was quite okay, but I can't see him continuing to do the same type of stuff for very long. Before his death he did that performance with a large ensemble in Montreux and performed all that old stuff he did with Gil Evans. I think it's possible that he would have dropped the electronics after several records and banked on live performances with acoustic ensembles. That was the other strong branch of "commercial jazz" in the 90s along with the fusion styles - the return to the roots. Everyone was doing that again by the mid-90s.

Yeah, Laswell could have worked out. Unfortunately, Miles didn't really do the "coolest possible" type of jazz-fusion in the 80s with Marcus Miller and it might have been the case that he would have done even dumber shit (pardon me that expression, but some of Miles' 80s output sounds so dated now that it's almost unlisteneable). With someone like Laswell, yeah, it could have worked out. I have other names like John Zorn in my mind, but don't know how realistic a collaboration with that type of names would have been.

I would personally say that while Miles was playing very well (especially strongly live in the mid-'80s), he had various problems behind the scenes -

Miles apparently was unwilling to compose new stuff of his own for Warner cos Columbia I believe would get a sizeable portion of that income, due to business dealings, hence his extensive work with other composers in the '80s. He did play some new (mostly unremarkable) self-written pieces in concert, which were released on live albums by Warner after his death.

Miles' health was in decline during the late '80s-early '90s, so he may well have sensed the 'dying of the light' as it were, so relied more on collaborators than usual. It has often been speculated that his appearance at Montreaux with Q in 1991 was done very much with Miles (initially very reluctant to revisit his past, however much he loved his friend Gil Evans' and the work they did), possibly sensing his days were numbered, and kinda thinking this project would bring him 'full circle'. He was very weak and underrehearsed for that very challenging performance, showing clear breathing problems, thus explaining why they had Wallace Roney there as his 'safety net', filling in for Miles' parts when Miles was too short of breath or made an error playing the quite intricate parts.

I also think there was a certain element of the studio music being less important to Miles in his final period than it had been to him previously. Nobody in their right mind (save jazz critic Stanley Crouch anyway) can say that most of what Miles was doing from 1970 to 75 was 'commercial' music, the later material of that era being rather dark and austere. By '75, Miles was in a very dark place physically and mentally, with him then spending five years as a relapsed drug-addicted retired semi-recluse.

I think when he came back in 1980-81, he was just pleased to still be alive, able to play, perform and to relax and actually be 'Miles Davis', musician and celebrity again, having dinner at the White House in 1987 etc, and pursuing a more 'commercial' sound in the '80s to make a buck or two. His concerts were where the real artistry lay for Miles in the '80s, as witnessed on the 'Live at Montreaux' material.

As to what Miles should have done in the '90s had he survived, I would have liked to have seen some form of artistic, creative collaboration with Prince in the studio (I think Can I Play With You is a great funk rock track, but Miles is very much adding flourishes and you could remove him from the track and it wouldn't make much difference). Working with Bill Laswell would have been an ideal fit for Miles, as Laswell is a far less 'commercial' and 'egotistical' collaborator than Prince arguably is, and Laswell in the late '90s was clearly highly influenced by Miles' first electric period work, and understood that music, as shown IMO by Laswell's excellent 'Panthalassa' Miles' 'remix/ reimageining' album of 1998.

I can definitely imagine Miles doing two or three hip hop-influenced collaborative albums (with mixed results at a guess, though the semi-unfinished Doo Bop is perhaps his freshest, most fun album in years, with Miles playing his ass off throughout) and then flirting with drum n' bass sounds with someone like Goldie or Roni Size, as there's plenty of space for soloing in that stuff.

There are plenty of would-be Miles Davis sound-a-like trumpet players out there today and over the last 20 years who have explored hip hop and drum n' bass, ambient etc, so it's not too hard to get an impression of what Miles might have got up to had he lived another 15 years .

MarshallStacks said:

novabrkr said:

Doobop was quite okay, but I can't see him continuing to do the same type of stuff for very long. Before his death he did that performance with a large ensemble in Montreux and performed all that old stuff he did with Gil Evans. I think it's possible that he would have dropped the electronics after several records and banked on live performances with acoustic ensembles. That was the other strong branch of "commercial jazz" in the 90s along with the fusion styles - the return to the roots. Everyone was doing that again by the mid-90s.

Yeah, Laswell could have worked out. Unfortunately, Miles didn't really do the "coolest possible" type of jazz-fusion in the 80s with Marcus Miller and it might have been the case that he would have done even dumber shit (pardon me that expression, but some of Miles' 80s output sounds so dated now that it's almost unlisteneable). With someone like Laswell, yeah, it could have worked out. I have other names like John Zorn in my mind, but don't know how realistic a collaboration with that type of names would have been.

I would personally say that while Miles was playing very well (especially strongly live in the mid-'80s), he had various problems behind the scenes -

Miles apparently was unwilling to compose new stuff of his own for Warner cos Columbia I believe would get a sizeable portion of that income, due to business dealings, hence his extensive work with other composers in the '80s. He did play some new (mostly unremarkable) self-written pieces in concert, which were released on live albums by Warner after his death.

Miles' health was in decline during the late '80s-early '90s, so he may well have sensed the 'dying of the light' as it were, so relied more on collaborators than usual. It has often been speculated that his appearance at Montreaux with Q in 1991 was done very much with Miles (initially very reluctant to revisit his past, however much he loved his friend Gil Evans' and the work they did), possibly sensing his days were numbered, and kinda thinking this project would bring him 'full circle'. He was very weak and underrehearsed for that very challenging performance, showing clear breathing problems, thus explaining why they had Wallace Roney there as his 'safety net', filling in for Miles' parts when Miles was too short of breath or made an error playing the quite intricate parts.

I also think there was a certain element of the studio music being less important to Miles in his final period than it had been to him previously. Nobody in their right mind (save jazz critic Stanley Crouch anyway) can say that most of what Miles was doing from 1970 to 75 was 'commercial' music, the later material of that era being rather dark and austere. By '75, Miles was in a very dark place physically and mentally, with him then spending five years as a relapsed drug-addicted retired semi-recluse.

I think when he came back in 1980-81, he was just pleased to still be alive, able to play, perform and to relax and actually be 'Miles Davis', musician and celebrity again, having dinner at the White House in 1987 etc, and pursuing a more 'commercial' sound in the '80s to make a buck or two. His concerts were where the real artistry lay for Miles in the '80s, as witnessed on the 'Live at Montreaux' material.

As to what Miles should have done in the '90s had he survived, I would have liked to have seen some form of artistic, creative collaboration with Prince in the studio (I think Can I Play With You is a great funk rock track, but Miles is very much adding flourishes and you could remove him from the track and it wouldn't make much difference). Working with Bill Laswell would have been an ideal fit for Miles, as Laswell is a far less 'commercial' and 'egotistical' collaborator than Prince arguably is, and Laswell in the late '90s was clearly highly influenced by Miles' first electric period work, and understood that music, as shown IMO by Laswell's excellent 'Panthalassa' Miles' 'remix/ reimageining' album of 1998.

I can definitely imagine Miles doing two or three hip hop-influenced collaborative albums (with mixed results at a guess, though the semi-unfinished Doo Bop is perhaps his freshest, most fun album in years, with Miles playing his ass off throughout) and then flirting with drum n' bass sounds with someone like Goldie or Roni Size, as there's plenty of space for soloing in that stuff.

There are plenty of would-be Miles Davis sound-a-like trumpet players out there today and over the last 20 years who have explored hip hop and drum n' bass, ambient etc, so it's not too hard to get an impression of what Miles might have got up to had he lived another 15 years .

Interesting.

I've read the other day that Michel Legrand actually composed everything on Dingo: Miles was lazy and just telling him "let's drink and eat and chat" until Legrand, seeing the dealine arriving, said "OK, how about I compose the shit and u just play on it whatever comes 2 mind", and Miles was like "cool" and he just walked in and improvised his parts after everything was in the box, so Miles wasn't at all responsible for the neo-classical aspects of that one at least. I'm very surprised that the genesis of the Montreux (not Montreaux) per4mance in 91 isn't more documented, don't we really know how it came to be?

I tend to find Miles' per4mances from 85-91 as boring as the records overall. It's not that I dislike these years entirely, I just find it unchallenging. The early 80's stuff (before You're Under Arrest) is somewhat darker and more challenging, but still sounds quite "bad" in terms of synthesizers choices. It's funny I remember my mom in the 80's... basically no one really understood what Miles was doing. Openminded jazz fans like my mom were quite fascinated by the modernity of his sound, without realizing that there were many better things in the 80's because they weren't into new wave, pop and electrofunk, and jazz purists like my dad were openly rejecting the stuff for the principle of it. Everyone was quite puzzled at the guy who'd done Kind Of Blue covering Cindy Lauper I think the only people who could really get what was happening were non-jazz listeners, but then they probably didn't find it so challenging.

Herbie and Miles were the 2 major jazz icons to embrace pop music and electronic sounds in the 80's and they did it in a very different way. Does anyone who was there remember how critics and jazz listeners compared their 2 approaches? Because I'm quite sure some did. And I'm also quite sure that while Miles' music was still quite accessible and sounded just like "bad music" to jazz purists, they couldn't even recognize Herbie's albums as being music at all anymore