On the heels of a performance in Pescara that saw the band take avant funk into some truly uncharted turf, the Miles Davis septet rolled into Verona for another open-air show at an ancient Roman theater on the bank of the Adige. Though outdoor sets were surely a welcome break from the arenas and staid concert halls to which the band had grown accustomed, a handful of venues seemed woefully unprepared for the volume coming off the stage as evidenced by this uncharacteristically uneven pair of sets in Verona.

Despite a dodgy stage mix and jagged grooves that often fail to coalesce it’s impressive to hear the band soldier on through a gig that’s clearly a struggle from the outset. The show’s also an odd one for Miles, who abandons the organ for reasons unknown and sounds downright uninspired on trumpet throughout. A dark night for sure, but not without its bright spots.

The back stretch of the Miles Davis septet’s Japan > Euro summer tour brought them to the Adriatic coastal town of Pescara for an outdoor festival at the Parco delle Naiadi. Five days removed from a technically challenging but fascinating gig in Paris, the band followed a Keith Jarrett solo set with a truly Jekyll & Hyde performance – the first half a relatively straightforward slab of heavy funk followed by a two-song closing set that’s easily the most gripping, avant-garde 58 minutes of music we’ve heard from an electric Miles lineup.

The audience tape was presumably recorded stage left in close proximity to Reggie Lucas’ amplifier, pushing his constantly wah’d rhythm guitar to the front of the mix. Though a bit overpowering at times, it reveals how crucial this dual-guitar lineup was to the band’s framework, as well as the less-than-subtle James Brown influence that lurked just below the surface.

From the site of his 1949 love affair with Juliette Gréco to his legendary soundtrack session for Louis Malle’s “Elevator to the Gallows”, a fractious date with Coltrane in the Spring of ’61 and into a killer string of electric dates, Paris provided Miles with a well of inspiration rivaled only by New York City. Despite a mountain of technical challenges that plagued him throughout, this July performance at the Olympia is an absolute monster, all thanks to a working group that’s in peak form from end to end.

The show’s also a rare one in that it features no keyboard – though we can hear the Yamaha organ briefly sputter to life toward the end of the set, the instrument seems to fall victim to the same ghosts that sideline Mtume’s beatbox and often send Miles’ trumpet spiraling into an ocean of feedback. A battle of man vs. machine that makes for a thriller of a tape.