Category: Soundboard Recording

2.7 + 2.8.1975 Tokyo

On By Jeremy ErwinIn 1975, Audience Recording, Soundboard Recording

With 11 shows under its belt, the Miles Davis septet capped its final overseas journey with a trio of shows at Tokyo’s Koseinenkinkaikan Hall – the same venue where its tour of Japan began two weeks earlier. Though the tour’s justifiably remembered for the performances from Osaka that produced the Agharta and Pangaea live LPs, the rapid evolution of the band and the drastically different performances documented across this brief run of shows are equally stunning.

Whereas the septet went all-in on dark, heady abstraction in the tour’s opening nights in Tokyo, by the time it reached Kokura a week later its sets were tight, deeply funky, and outright jubilant. A few days on in Osaka, the band was simply untouchable in its technical prowess, performing as if guided by an invisible hand to produce a quartet of sets that remain futuristic nearly five decades after their final notes faded.

Back in Tokyo for the tour’s finale, the band is new again – radically reshaping familiar material with confidence and swagger, unafraid to truncate epics like “Ife” or “Zimbabwe” down to their essence, or playfully stretch tunes like “Maiysha” to 30 minutes and beyond with long passages of experimentation. A thrilling listen from start to finish, these final dispatches from Tokyo encapsulate everything that made this Japanese tour so exceptional.

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11.14.1971 Venice

On By Jeremy ErwinIn 1971, Soundboard Recording

The final leg of the 1971 Newport Festival in Europe tour brought the Miles Davis septet back to Italy for a trio of performances in and around the “upper-boot” region. This audience tape from the magnificent Teatro della Fenice (seen below) captures the first of three consecutive nights of shows.

The mismatch of a heavily amplified jazz-funk septet in an 18th-century opera house results in an audience tape that leaves a lot to be desired – percussion and horns dominate the mix, Keith Jarrett’s keyboards are buried but audible, and Michael Henderson’s bass is often merely a suggestion. Still, this is an incredible display no matter the barriers.

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10.27.1971 Paris

On By Jeremy ErwinIn 1971, Soundboard Recording

The Miles Davis septet returned to the Théâtre Nationale Populaire in Paris for a two-set headlining performance just a few days after its initial appearance as part of the Newport Jazz Festival in Europe package tour. While the first Paris gig was a sprawling, unruly behemoth of a set (at 114 minutes it was the longest recorded show of Miles’ career), the performances on the 27th each clocked in at 90 minutes and boasted identical setlists – a rare display of uniformity from Miles though one he clearly enjoyed, as the band performed the same setlist for the next eight straight nights.

Like the previous Paris show, both sets on the 27th were reportedly filmed for television, which is likely the source of this somewhat lo-fi audio document. Unfortunately, the accompanying film footage has remained in the archives of Office de Radiodiffusion-Télévision Française since its initial broadcast.

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10.23.1971 Paris

On By Jeremy ErwinIn 1971, Soundboard Recording

The Miles Davis septet’s October 23, 1971 performance at Théâtre Nationale Populaire in Paris was the first of two the band played at the venue during its European tour. This first stop was likely part of the Newport Jazz Festival in Europe tour itinerary, while a two-set show at the Théâtre Nationale Populaire four days later on October 27 was probably a one-off headlining gig.

Photos from 10.23.1971 by Philippe Charpentier

At 114 minutes, this complete October 23 audience tape is the longest recorded set of Miles’ electric period (narrowly edging out this late 1970 tape of mystery origin by 5 minutes). It’s also the first of the band’s 1971 European tour performances to be filmed for television, 30 minutes of which were broadcast as Jazz Session: Newport à Paris (below). Footage of the complete concert, as well as both sets on the 27th, remain in the archives of Office de Radiodiffusion-Télévision Française.

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5.7.1971 Fillmore West

On By Jeremy ErwinIn 1971, Soundboard Recording

Miles played his final set of career-redefining Fillmore shows May 6-9, 1971 at Bill Graham’s Fillmore West. Anticipating the emergence of stadium and arena gigs that would define the 1970s, Graham closed his Fillmore East on June 27, followed by the Fillmore West on July 4, 1971. Though it’s presumed both Columbia and the Fillmore recorded the sextet’s four shows opening for the Elvin Bishop Group and Mandrill, only this May 7 soundboard recording is in circulation. Often overshadowed by the many recordings the band made at Fillmores East and West the previous year, this tape easily holds its own as the most ultra-modern of the bunch.

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10.15 – 10.18.1970 Fillmore West

On By Jeremy ErwinIn 1970, Broadcast Recording, Soundboard Recording

The Miles Davis septet returned to Bill Graham’s Fillmore West in October 1970 a dramatically different band than the one that shared a 4-night stand with the Grateful Dead earlier in the year. Gone was the effects-laden headiness, unpredictability, and unrelenting intensity that defined those April shows, replaced here by four identical sets built around dense, repetitive grooves. The resulting performances were likely a bit easier for the Fillmore audience to digest, and judging from their reaction on the tapes, the crowd certainly dug it.

In a typically eccentric Fillmore pairing, the septet shared the bill with Leon Russell, with support from Seatrain and Hammer. Not exactly the time traveler destination of a Miles Davis/Grateful Dead matchup, but a marked improvement from opening for Steve Miller. Curiously, there are no known photos from the October 15-18 shows, and tapes from only three of the four nights are in circulation – none of them complete. The fidelity of the October 15th tape suggests the shows were professionally taped, so a future Bootleg Series release may not be out of the question.

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8.18.1970 Tanglewood

On By Jeremy ErwinIn 1970, Soundboard Recording

The septet’s performance at the Tanglewood Music Center was the finale in a series of “Fillmore at Tanglewood” shows produced by Bill Graham in the summer of 1970. In one of the better pairings of the year, the band shared the bill with The Voices of East Harlem choir and the Graham-managed Santana, and given that half the septet was resplendent in sleeveless muscle shirts (captured on the Tribute to Jack Johnson LP cover), it was clearly a late August scorcher in the Berkshires.

The gig is the first known record of Gary Bartz on soprano and alto sax, who’d replaced Steve Grossman after a 5-month run with the septet. Evident within the first few moments of his “Directions” solo, Bartz meshed with the band impeccably and would remain with Miles for the next two years – the ensemble’s longest-serving reed player until Miles’ hiatus in 1975.

Notably, this is also the band’s second to last performance with Chick Corea and Dave Holland onboard, and the final recording of Corea on Fender Rhodes, as both he and Jarrett would perform on somewhat oddball loaner keyboards at the penultimate Isle of Wight gig.

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8.2.1970 Nassau, Bahamas

On By Jeremy ErwinIn 1970, Soundboard Recording

This brief, but complete tape from the CBS Records Convention in the Bahamas is a bit of an anomaly. The septet performed a truncated set to an audience of CBS Records personnel and despite no photos, video, or first-hand accounts of the event, this soundboard recording mysteriously appeared decades after the fact.

Brief sets weren’t uncommon for the band in 1970; they played a lot of festivals and supporting gigs, and even made a couple of TV appearances. This was a different beast: a 25-minute show for a small audience of invited guests, many of whom were responsible for promoting Miles’ records. The resulting set (young Steve Grossman’s swan song with the band) is an ultra-potent cross-section of nearly everything that made this lineup so exceptional.

Miles with CBS Records head, Clive Davis in 1969
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4.9 – 4.12.1970 Fillmore West

On By Jeremy ErwinIn 1970, Official Release, Soundboard Recording

Having sized up Bill Graham’s Fillmore audience with two nights at Fillmore East the month prior, the Miles Davis sextet arrived at Fillmore West well-prepared for a four-night run opening for the Grateful Dead. They were also riding high on the release Bitches Brew, unleashed just days prior on March 30th, and by all accounts were fully intent on upstaging, outplaying, and straight-up out-psychedelicizing the Dead with nightly mind-melting sets.

Bassist Phil Lesh recalls his reaction to the April Fillmore West shows in his memoir, Searching for Sound: My Life with the Grateful Dead

As I listened, leaning over the amps with my jaw hanging agape, trying to comprehend the forces that Miles was unleashing onstage, I was thinking, “What’s the use? How can we possibly play after this? We should just go home and try to digest this unbelievable shit.“

Like most of Miles’ Fillmore gigs, all four nights were recorded, with the evening of April 11th memorialized on the Columbia double LP, Black Beauty.

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