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94 of 95 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
A caveat, October 30, 2001
This review is from: The Complete Bitches Brew Sessions (Audio CD)
A word of warning: the set does not contain the "complete" album sessions, as the title indicates. Nothing extra from the August '69 sessions that produced the album is included here, although the liner notes refer to rehearsal tapes that still exist. All of the extra material included is from unrelated sessions led by Miles in the following winter, when Miles introduced a sitar into his band and worked mostly on open-ended, spacey slow jams, which people today would call "ambient" music. Apparently, most reviewers here are not put off by this fact. After all, the music from the original album is incredible and now sounds better than ever; and you may find the later ambient experiments involving the sitar as fascinating as they do. I just can't help feeling disappointed that the box does not deliver what the title promises. The tape was rolling for everything, the notes say, and yet... we get to hear nothing but the masters from the sessions that actually produced the album. I was hoping for insight into how the music of B*Brew came together (as Box 5 in the series does for In A Silent Way), and the notes tease us with stories about key little moments in the studio; but, although Bob Belden and Michael Cuscuna apparently thought these moments were interesting enough to discuss in the notes, they share none of these tapes with us. Five stars for the music from the original album. Take away one star for the misleading title, and another because the extra material is less interesting to me. Unless you're a fanatic for Miles, and must hear everything he did, then the 2-CD reissue of the original album is probably a better bang for your buck. It has the same great remastered sound, and even comes with "Feio" as a bonus track. If you got that and the reissue of Big Fun, you'd have all the major cuts from this set except for "Corrado" and "Guinevere."
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24 of 24 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
You Gots To Get This ..., August 25, 1999
By A Customer
This review is from: The Complete Bitches Brew Sessions (Audio CD)
Yes, you should get this rather than the 2CD version. I'll admit there is a little stuff on here that's "filler", where not much is happening. But not very much. The tracks which were issued on subsequent releases over the years (when Miles was still alive by the way) namely "Guenniviere", "Great Expectations", "Lonely Fire", "Orange Lady" demand to be heard. They are actually a bit heavier than the tracks on "Bitches Brew", which were the first tracks cut. Now, you could buy them as part of "Directions", "Circle In The Round", and "Big Fun", but I think you're better served getting them in this package. That way you get the previously unreleased pieces - which are rather heavy also! The fact that they stayed unreleased all that time, that there were more secret treasures to be unearthed from those sessions, is amazing. To dig something up unheard in 30 years and for it to sound fresh and gripping ... The newly released tracks are generally skeletal and/or spacey. Some of them, written by Zawinul & Shorter, clearly serve as the ancestor to Weather Report. Much of modern music aspires to the sense of etherial groove present in this music. It's beautiful and perfect. I've been listening to it for 15 years now and I'm as into the music today as I ever was. Miles was an artist of the highest caliber, and this is a peak era of his.
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17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Very nice..., December 3, 2006
I remember buying this in high school. Miles wasn't particularly popular at the time, and my brother gave me a look and said "why did you buy this crap?". My brother, ironically, would get into jazz when he got into college, yet, never apologised for this insult. As for this music, it's truly outstanding. It's incredibly complicated stuff, sometimes with 3 keyboardists, 2 drummers, 2 bassists all playing at once, with Miles on top of it all. The initial 6 tracks are some of the greatest stuff I've ever heard, with Spanish Key being my favorite. I remember being put off by it a bit at the time. The only Davis albums I had at the time were the mediocre The Man with the Horn, and the better We Want Miles, so I wasn't up on the great Miles. I have around 28 Miles CD's now, and this is definitely top five. I like Big Fun better, but the music there was from these sessions, so it's a bit confusing. The remastering is light years superior to the vinyl, and is definitely worth the upgrade. It also has superlative liner notes, detailing the sessions and some good historical background. As for the bonus tracks, most of this material was released on other albums. The songs Great Expectations, Orange Lady, and Lonely Fire ended up on the original release of Big Fun. Recollections, Trevere, The Little Blue Frog (master take), and Yaphet were also released on the remastered version of Big Fun. Guiniverre ended up on Circle in the Round (in a slightly shorter version), and Double Image (the short version) ended up on Live Evil. So there are only 6 actual new tracks (Corrado, The Big Green Serpent, an alternate take of The Little Blue Frog, Feio, a slightly longer version of Double Image, and Take It or Leave It). These 6 are good, but unless you really adore Miles, you may be able to do without them, even though I think this is a good set to have.
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