1970 · Album
Bitches Brew
Recorded August 19–21, 1969 · Columbia Records · Produced by Teo Macero
Electric Storm Over Studio B
Davis plugged in and left traditional jazz behind, and nothing sounded quite the same afterward.
By 1969, Miles Davis had already done more than enough to secure his place in any serious conversation about American music. But he wasn't interested in coasting. After the quiet, floating beauty of In a Silent Way (1969), Davis went back into Columbia's Studio B in New York City over three days in August of that year and recorded something far more aggressive, far more unsettled — a sprawling double album that announced, loudly, that he was done with acoustic jazz as a primary mode of expression. Bitches Brew is not an easy listen, but it is a rewarding one once you understand what you're hearing.
What Davis assembled in the studio was a large, shifting ensemble built around electric instruments — electric piano, electric bass, electric guitar — layered over multiple drummers and percussionists playing simultaneously, with no single rhythmic anchor to hold onto. Tracks like 'Pharaoh's Dance' and 'Miles Runs the Voodoo Down' don't swing in any conventional sense. Instead, they churn and pulse, with Davis's trumpet cutting through the murk in short, stabbing phrases. The band included players like Chick Corea, Larry Young, and Joe Zawinul on keyboards, John McLaughlin on guitar, and Wayne Shorter on soprano saxophone, among others — a remarkable collection of musicians who would each go on to define their own corners of jazz and fusion. Producer Teo Macero then edited and assembled the raw sessions into the final tracks, which means what you're hearing is partly a compositional act in the control room, not just a live performance captured on tape.
The result is something genuinely unusual — not jazz in the bebop or hard bop sense, not rock either, but something that borrows the electric texture and rhythmic looseness of rock and soul and runs it through an improvisation-heavy framework where structure can dissolve and reform at any moment. 'Bitches Brew' itself, the title track, runs over twenty-six minutes across two sides of the original vinyl and gives you the full experience: long stretches of dense, overlapping texture followed by moments where Davis's trumpet emerges with startling clarity. Some listeners find it exhausting; others find it thrilling. Both reactions are fair.
This is one of those albums where honest enthusiasm is warranted. It is genuinely ambitious and genuinely accomplished — not in the sense that every moment is perfectly balanced, but in the sense that Davis was attempting something specific and pulled it off. If you've spent time with his acoustic work — Kind of Blue (1959), Milestones (1958) — Bitches Brew will feel like a deliberate rupture, and that's exactly what it is. Come to it ready to let go of familiar signposts, and it opens up considerably.
Who's playing
Dave Hollandbass
Bennie Maupinbass clarinet
Harvey Brookselectric bass guitar
John McLaughlinguitar
Wayne Shortersoprano saxophone
Miles Davistrumpet
Jack DeJohnettedrums
Lenny Whitedrums
Juma Santospercussion
Don Aliascongas
Jim Rileycongas, shakers
Chick Coreakeyboard
Larry Youngkeyboard
Joe Zawinulkeyboard
Where next?
More by Miles Davis
All 59 albums →
The musicians on this record
Crystal Silence 1973
Chick Corea
plays keyboard here
plays keyboard here
Adam's Apple 1967
Wayne Shorter
plays soprano saxophone here
plays soprano saxophone here
Zawinul 1971
Joe Zawinul
plays keyboard here
plays keyboard here
Mother Ship 1969
Larry Young
plays keyboard here
plays keyboard here
