Interesting. Did you get any sense of what Pete did after the Miles band broke up? He appeared on one Herbie Hancock album but i always got the sense that he fell on hard times.
He played me some good post-Miles recordings that he made. Not sure of all the details of what happened after Miles but he did have an eccentric streak, and seemed the type who would rather do nothing at all than do something not on his terms. However, he was a very nice man and spoke about the Miles experience in detail as if it had happened yesterday. This was in 2004.
pbuzby, I understand you're not Pete and you cannot answer to all of our questions... But please understand that're avid for this kind of info. That conversation was before the complete OTC sessions came out. Not a lot of official outputs by then. Was he happy with the live albums ? Did he feel those represented them well as a live band? And Get up with it !? Any comments from him on that one? Thank you for this wonderful posts.
Sorry, we didn't talk much about either of those topics. He did mention that the day after the Agharta/Pangaea concerts, they played a concert that they thought was much better than those two, but Teo Macero had taken the recording gear and gone home. Miles said about Teo, "well, he blew it again!"
On the subject of Teo, what are other listeners views on him as a producer? Whenever I see him mentioned in articles, most of the times it’s with the implication that he’s bastardised jazz by chopping up, and copy/pasting takes into new pieces. I personally love the electric albums, but is there a reason he doesn’t seem to get the praise he deserves?
I'm a Teo fan. An educated and experienced musician who knew what he was doing. I think he did a great job with the electric Miles Davis albums, and had many great accomplishments as a producer before that. I was just listening to some of his tenor playing yesterday. A number of the albums that first enthralled me as a new jazz fan were his products--works by Brubeck, Monk, Davis and others.
I was surprised to read in Gary Burton's autobio that he had a bad experience working with Teo Macero on a Bob Brookmeyer album in 1964 (where Herbie Hancock and Ron Carter also played), saying that Teo went out during a lunch break and bought sheet music for standards and then forced the group to record them. It was around that time that Miles had a falling out with Teo, claiming that he was at fault for the disappointing Quiet Nights. I guess Macero was in a better frame of mind for the late 60's and 70's electric Miles albums as I like his work there very much.
I can't for the life of me think of a McFarland album produced by Macero. Creed Taylor in this time period, sure.
I don’t claim to have read everything written about Teo Macero, but I don’t remember having read anything other than praise, or at least respect when it comes to his ‘70s work. Maybe the criticism you mention stems from the period immediately following the release of the albums? I can’t think of any reason why someone with the benefit of hindsight should criticise his work—at least no music critic in their right minds. If you look at how music evolved after Teo’s and Miles’s experiments, you can’t help to think of how ahead of their time they actually were.
I think Teo was great too. In a Silent Way and Bitches Brew wouldn't exist without Teo, not as we know them. And he recorded Monk and everyone. Some of the later 70s material could maybe have been mixed and edited a bit sharper, but that's all in hindsight and as stated they were pioneers of a new type of music. And he could handle Miles and his whims...
I think "Moja" still has a better ring to it I sorta get the impression -and forgive me for the Beatles reference- that Teo Macero production-wise was like the George Martin of jazz, possibly with a little Geoff Emerick thrown in. Teo wasn't afraid to experiment. Hell, he took about twenty minutes of music and turned it into In A Silent Way- my hat goes off to him for that alone The January 22 '75 Tokyo soundboard is pretty good.
This is the only one of the boxes I don't have physically. I've got a digital download which is worthwhile, and good value-certainly compared to the s/h cost of the box! It's monumental isn't it. There's a lot of music with not much repetition, at least after a few casual listens. Some of it is great, some less interesting. But bearing in mind that this is the output from just two nights of a longer playing gig it is hard to comprehend the level of invention that would have to be sustained. I can forgive Miles's tone, where it dips, or at least sounds a bit off. What I do appreciate are his extended solos, and the different approaches to familiar material-he's given the band a lot of freedom here, to fill out the time. Williams is dynamic, Shorter is good, but I struggle to pick out sublime moments. Carter is solid, but I've got to crank up the bass to really hear him. Herbie is quiet. I think I will return to this set when I get to the end of the 65-68 run.
That's quite possible. I don't have them in front of me, but perhaps I read something to do with period-specific criticism mentioned in the liner notes of my In a Silent Way, or Jack Johnson CDs.
Bill Laswelll suggests in the sleevenotes/justifications for the Panthalassa remix album that Teo wasn't tuned into Miles' electric music. I can't remember whether Laswell is giving just his own opinion, or whether he ascribes this opinion to Miles.
If Teo wasn’t tuned into “Electric Miles”, I don’t know who else at that time would have. At least Teo had the experience of having worked with Miles for at least 10 years, and that must be worth a lot already. Sure, we can speculate how the music would have sounded had somebody else produced (or had Miles himself done it), but in such a rarefied music genre there aren’t many personalities who could have taken Teo’s place.
Found this interview I remember reading a couple of years ago. Here's a part on the subject you were discussing TLM: What about producer Teo Macero - what exactly was his role and how influential was he on the final product as it where? Pete Cosey: I guess as it turns out he was responsible for the mixing. I don't think Miles ever did that. Electric music really wasn't his [Teo's] forte. I don't want to bad-mouth the guy and you can't argue with success - and I guess to a degree it was successful - but if you had had someone who was more steeped in electric music and the music of the day, things might have been a little more up-to-date. Because if you listen to comparable albums, maybe Agharta for instance, the Japanese version and another version Teo mixed, there's a difference. When the album first came out and I had both of them sent to me and I noticed the difference immediately with the sound and the mix. Complete interview, enjoy: Pete Cosey: Interviews: The Last Miles: The Music Of Miles Davis 1980 - 1991: A book by George Cole
Some of Miles's fans are jazz purists who don't like any editing or post-production. I run into that sometimes in discussions of the electric Miles albums.
Miles' Electric Music wasn't Teo's forte? That's what he said? Wow. Not his forte. The guy who produced several unique works of art that we're still all raving about 40-odd years later. Yeah, right.
The editorial decisions on the electric albums were almost entirely Teo's. Whether one likes the finished results or not, his importance can't be overstated.
Here's another passage that I just don't know what to conclude. Pete Cosey ... after Dark Magus, when we went back to the house and listened to the tape of the Carnegie Hall concert, Miles didn't like what the horns were doing at all... (Was Miles aware that this music was being put into an album in Japan? Man... nothing is simple on the Miles electric period)
