Bitches Brew
I wouldn't say this is Miles best Album, but I think the experiment as some would call it was successful. If this is nothing more than an experiment in heaping dimished and minor chords on top of each other with tape loops...if people want to reduce it to that I don't object. However I have to say this is Phenomenal. As an experiment it works 100% - I've been listening to it regularly for a long time and have not tired of it. It is magestically apocalyptic with no regrets.

stanley crouch hates it , it must be good.
when neocon jazz protectors like stanley crouch and wynton [whens the last time he's made a good album] marsalis. spew such venom toward any music by a jazz artist that doesnt fit in their little bop box, degrade an album of admittedly challenging music, they do us all a diservice, as if saying "that aint jazz" means it isnt worthy of respect,as great as miles davis was, basically being a founding father of bop, cool jazz modal postbop, acid jazz , jazz funk and even electronica [he loved him madly from get up with it] dispute it if you will, but miles davis is certainly the greatest jazz figure of post war era. critically hated albums like on the corner, have been reinvestigated by the generation x'rs and have influenced so many electronica artists, as well as modern rock bands,i cant see how stanley crouch and the neo cons cant just agree to disagree, and let it be.now to the album. i am going to go out on a limb. I believe that bitches brew is miles's masterpiece, i know. i know, what about kind of blue, or miles smiles, or porgy and bess, all classics and certainly in the top 10 jazz albums of all time. but bitches brew was something never heard before.and to say sly and the family stone was an influence on this is laughable,[that influence would come later], the term jazz rock doesnt do this album justice, this album has the darkest chilliest and emotion stirring , or thought pravoking sound i have ever heard ,before or since. "pharoahs dance composed by joe zawinul, has this concrete jungle sound , that seems to take me into utter loneliness , dispair maybe ,i always get reflective, and some times my mind wanders off, i first heard this track 10 years ago.and the thing that struck me ,was how modern it sounded , surely not dated, and each time i hear it , it never seems dated , it alway sounds fresh and new.i would almost call this art jazz , but is it realy that jazzy, these are, jazz musicians , is it industrial jazz? the title track bitches brew, the longest track, 26 minutes is much the same.if not more isolating in feeling.but other passages in the track hint at a better tomorrow. ten spanish key the minor vamp groove piece realy cooks, and always puts me in mind of someone struggling to break free, to escape the isolation of the first 2 tracks. and the little ditty john mclauglin, breif, brief but to the point,reafirms spanish keys effort to escape that concrete jungle dispair of the first 2 tracks. then by the time you get to "miles runs the voodoo down" you feel as if youve escaped that lonely dispair, and with that gutbucket funky intro,and that balls to the wall miles trumpet solo 2 minutes in , i cant help but smile knowing this is it, nirvana.personnaly this solo is my favorite in all of his music. man miles was a lion during his "electric phase" jack johnson the live albums etc... hes soloing like a boxer. bob and weave ,jab, uppercut, roundhouse,and a punch to the gut.how the neo cons cant see the art form for what it is, great music , thought provoking , challenging,and exillirating . is beyond me, nothing i can say to open minded listeners who havent bought this album. judge for your self, but be warned, this is not easily digested music, it takes dozens of listens to truly grasp its greatness., if your not into this type of music. theirs alway that wynton and willie nelson album that just came out, uggghhh! to be fair wynton's album from 1999 [marciac suite] was a wonderful album and in my opinion his most realized album ,his masterpiece. but bitches brew is an undefinable assault on the mind. i just love it.

This CD could have been improved with a good trumpet player
Do not be intimidated into pretending you like this recording because you might not look cool. The main problem with this CD is that it is boring. Here's the formula: Take a has-been trumpeter who has lost his ability to play and add tons of reverb to his anemic solos. Add a bunch of great musicians who are all ten times better than the leader, but intimidated by his horrible personility. Let everyone jam without any direction. Give the CD an ugly cover and a stupid name. Defy anyone to be objective and realize what a total waste of time this is.

Roses are red, violets are blue, Miles reinvents music with Brew
Miles always had a way of turning the musical world on its ear when reinventing and redefining the confines of what music was supposed to be. This album is one of the best examples of what an innovator he was. It's hard to imagine what he had in mind when he took music in this direction. The world was immersed in a time of "the thinking man's art", when abstract art was meant to lead people to get what they wanted to draw from an artist's perception. In the visual arts, it was easy to create in the abstract. Miles seemed to take this concept into the world of music in a way that nobody else could have dreamed. "Organized abstraction" is a good way to describe this very original music. I probably don't have to mention that this album has often been called 'the invention of fusion' or the beginning of the fusion movement, although it bears little resemblance of what fusion evolved into in the '70s. Of course, a number of the kings of fusion, such as John McLaughlin, Benny Maupin, (Joe Zawinul and Wayne Shorter left this ensemble shortly after this to create Weather Report) etc. came from this experiment. Despite the abstract nature of this album, it somehow comes together as an incredibly cohesive entity, complete unto itself and surprisingly pleasant to the ears. This is definitely a musicians' album. It's difficult to not be impressed by the grand talent exhibited by all those who contributed to this album. From an artist's standpoint, this is a work of pure genius! I only gave it 4 stars because, due to the abstract nature of this work, you need to be in a certain mood to listen to this album all the way through.....but when you're in those certain moods, there is nothing like this album! Indeed, there really is nothing like this album!

One day, this album just clicked ...
I will start by saying that I don't know much about jazz--it's theory, styles, history, etc. I always liked older jazz/blues and discovered Miles Davis from Kind of Blue, which I first heard as background music at a party that drew my attention away from my friends and toward the music.

A friend suggested this disc as another classic Miles Davis CD so I bought it without ever having heard a track. I hated it. Then, one day, I was riding the subway home and Pharoah's Dance came up randomly on my ipod and it was as if a light had gone off and everything in the music and in the city made perfect sense (it's hard to describe).

I went on to explore the other tracks and have really grown to love and appreciate this album. It is very gritty and urban and, like a group of graffiti-covered tenement buildings, is so "ugly" that it's beautiful. If that makes any sense to you, then you will come to love this album, but expect to hate it at first.