Miles Davis: Live-Evil (2LP) [MUSIC ON VINYL]

Why you'll love it

This Music On Vinyl 2LP set is pressed on 180g audiophile vinyl in a gatefold jacket, so Mati Klarwein's cover art gets room to breathe. Rolling Stone's Robert Palmer heard no weak links in the band, and Stylus Magazine called it one of the funkiest albums ever recorded.

This edition

• 2LP set
• 180g vinyl
• Gatefold jacket

About the album

Davis asked painter Mati Klarwein for a picture of life on one side and evil on the other, and got a pregnant woman on the front and, on the back, a toad Klarwein modelled on J. Edgar Hoover's Time magazine cover. The music splits the same way: long, dense live jams from the Cellar Door in December 1970, cut and stitched together in the studio by Teo Macero, set against short, eerie studio pieces built mostly on Hermeto Pascoal tunes.

The live band is ferocious, with Gary Bartz on sax, Keith Jarrett on keyboards and Jack DeJohnette on drums, plus John McLaughlin, who came in for the final night. "Sivad" and "What I Say" hit hard, "Funky Tonk" is what Robert Christgau called Davis's most compelling rhythmic exploration to date, and Spin described McLaughlin's playing as Hindu heavy-metal fretwork. In between, "Little Church" and "Nem Um Talvez" float by like ghosts.

Pitchfork called it easily the most accessible of Davis's electric records. "Sivad" and "Selim" are Davis and Miles spelled backwards, which is about as close to a hint as the man ever gave.

Also at Kops: more Miles Davis on vinyl · browse Modern Jazz

Tracklist

Listen

On Columbia / Music On Vinyl (cat# MOVLP1483), a reissue of the 1971 album.