Round About Midnight or Sketches of Spain?

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Which Miles Davis album do you like better?

― Michael Copeland, Sunday, 13 March 2005 04:18 (twenty years ago)

Why these two albums? They're going for very different things. I probably pulled out Sketches of Spain a lot more initially, now I'd be more likely to pull out Round About Midnight. Cover art on RAM wins hands down (and SoS's cover art is great too)

― deej., Sunday, 13 March 2005 04:31 (twenty years ago)

To be honest, these two because they are part of the Tower Records sale right now and I couldn't decide which to order.

― Michael Copeland, Sunday, 13 March 2005 07:19 (twenty years ago)

miles ahead

― noizem duke (noize duke), Sunday, 13 March 2005 07:30 (twenty years ago)

oh god, in that case ... buy Sketches of Spain. It sounds like no other record you own, trust me, it's phenomenal. A singular work for sure -- but best not approached as a jazz record either.

― Stormy Davis (diamond), Sunday, 13 March 2005 07:33 (twenty years ago)

You should really get both, but if you can only buy one, get Sketches

― Keith C (kcraw916), Sunday, 13 March 2005 14:49 (twenty years ago)

Sketches!

― 57 7th (calstars), Sunday, 13 March 2005 16:20 (twenty years ago)

sketches EASY

― j blount (papa la bas), Sunday, 13 March 2005 16:22 (twenty years ago)

I don't think its that obvious.

RaM is a straight-ahead (relatively speaking) jazz album, Sketches is orchestrated awesomeness. Miles Ahead is worse than both.

― deej., Sunday, 13 March 2005 19:35 (twenty years ago)

Round. Sketches is easily Miles' worst album. That's right, worse than the Prestige stuff.

― Vic Funk, Sunday, 13 March 2005 19:40 (twenty years ago)

Why do you say that?

― deej., Sunday, 13 March 2005 19:41 (twenty years ago)

Because I like all his other albums better.

It's just over-orchestrated nonsense, the kinda thing that would've scored a Douglas Sirk or some preposterous Technicolor melodrama of the time. It seems like a lesser album, too, coming as it does on the heels of Kind of Blue and a couple of years before the second classic quintet. The only reason I still keep it is because I've got 30+ other albums of his. I really can't think of a redeeming quality it has.

― Vic Funk, Sunday, 13 March 2005 19:50 (twenty years ago)

I don't really dig the orchestrated stuff either, I like Miles best when its just him and a small group of hotshots.

― I got the job because I was so mean, while somehow appearing so kind. (AaronHz), Sunday, 13 March 2005 19:52 (twenty years ago)

Well, can't say I agree with that at all, obviously - I think it's a lot more fascinating than the soundtrack to a "preposterous Technicolor melodrama," simply because Gil Evans arranging skills are one-of-a-kind, and the way he does point-counterpoint with miles' trumpet gives it this conflicted vibrancy, the interplay between the two is like a cat and mouse game or something. I prefer Porgy and Bess myself, though.

― deej., Sunday, 13 March 2005 19:52 (twenty years ago)

six years pass...

Solea is such a great track. I love that endlessly suspended, unresolved sound.

― mississippi delta law grad (Hurting 2), Thursday, 30 June 2011 22:18 (fourteen years ago)

It's just over-orchestrated nonsense, the kinda thing that would've scored a Douglas Sirk or some preposterous Technicolor melodrama of the time.
think i like sketches for precisely this reason (minus the nonsense bit). gil evans' orchestrations/arrangements are kinda transporting in the same way those sirk melodramas can be. if you're open to that kind of thing.

― tylerw, Thursday, 30 June 2011 22:22 (fourteen years ago)

OTM

― shake it, shake it, sugary pee (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Thursday, 30 June 2011 22:30 (fourteen years ago)

yeah I don't really see why that's a bad thing, and anyway I as someone else said Gil Evans' arranging skills take this a few notches above a typical movie score of that sort.

― mississippi delta law grad (Hurting 2), Thursday, 30 June 2011 22:30 (fourteen years ago)

Also the dude who said that was knocking the PRESTIGE sessions as well, so wth is his opinion worth?

― mississippi delta law grad (Hurting 2), Thursday, 30 June 2011 22:31 (fourteen years ago)

not a lot

― tylerw, Thursday, 30 June 2011 22:33 (fourteen years ago)

fwiw though I tend to skip over Concerto de Aranjuez and I like the last three tracks the best.

― mississippi delta law grad (Hurting 2), Thursday, 30 June 2011 22:35 (fourteen years ago)

yeah i like those the best too, though there are some extraordinary passages in concerto.

― tylerw, Thursday, 30 June 2011 22:36 (fourteen years ago)

Maybe I'll grow into Sketches, and Gil Evans in general, when I grow old. Not yet, though.

― you've got great robot conflict (Eazy), Thursday, 30 June 2011 22:38 (fourteen years ago)

You shall wear the bottoms of your trousers rolled.

― mississippi delta law grad (Hurting 2), Thursday, 30 June 2011 22:39 (fourteen years ago)

five years pass...

http://www.openculture.com/2017/03/listen-to-grace-slicks-hair-raising-vocals-in-the-isolated-track-for-white-rabbit-1967.html

Drenched in echo, Slick sings with martial precision, completely in command of her vibrato and dipping and rising all through the Phrygian scale (also known as the Spanish or Gypsy scale.) And no wonder, the song was written in 1965 after an LSD trip at her Marin county home where Slick had listened to Miles Davis’ Sketches of Spain over and over again for 24 hours.

― j., Friday, 17 March 2017 01:47 (eight years ago)

Grateful Dead Spanish Jam also seems to be a direct lift. Think it was the Valentine's Day 68 set that had me really notice that.

― Stevolende, Friday, 17 March 2017 02:08 (eight years ago)

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