About Ethan Nahté
Location: Dallas
Occupation: Video & Film Producer/Director, Journalist, Titan Comics, Broadcast Coordinator
Bio: Began playing music in clubs @ the age of 13 while simultaneously getting published in school mags. Moved on to TV and has shot everything from naked women to wolves! He's traveled a 1/2 mile under the earth and a 1/2 mile above with his cameras! Currently working on a documentary, a book and attempts to sleep. LIVE'N'LOUD
Posts: 281
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Miles Davis has been gone for 15 years, but his awesome trumpet playing lives on in a new greatest hits called Cool & Collected. The 13 song disc contains songs ranging from 1956 to 1984. If you’re not a big jazz fan, you may think that it shouldn’t be too hard to find only 13 songs within a 28 year period because musicians don’t put out that many albums. Miles Davis not only set the industry on end with what became known as “cool jazz,” the man has more records out there than most bands could ever dream of. Davis recorded over 100 albums of his own material and that doesn’t count all of the greatest hits or the albums he appeared on, including his early days with Charlie Parker.
Cool & Collected features Davis’ work at various stages of his long career (the trumpet maestro recorded from the ages of 19-65), including when members of his band were the likes of John Coltrane (tenor sax), Philly Joe Jones (drums), Herbie Hancock, Josef Zawinul & Chick Corea (piano) and many more talented guys playing all kinds of horns, bass and guitars. There’s even a previously unreleased remixed version of “It’s About That Time” that features 7 new musicians within the mix including guitarist Carlos Santana.
Other songs such as Davis’ own “Milestones” or “Seven Steps To Heaven” really get the blood pumping. There are also a lot of songs originally written by other guys that Davis transformed into his own creature like “Bye Bye Blackbird” and the Cyndi Lauper hit “Time After Time.”
The songs that really stand out are the ones that make you feel like you’re in a smoke-filled room with a gorgeous dame at your side; James Cagney is in one corner chatting it up with Bogey and Mae West is elegantly strutting through the room. You have a royal flush in one hand and a bourbon and coke in the other as you listen to the soulful, refreshing notes that dance through your head with warmth and resonance. Not that Lite Jazz garbage, but the good stuff that makes for a perfect evening. Songs such as “So What” or “Summertime” from Porgy and Bess followed up by Thelonius Monks “ ‘Round Midnight” or his tune “Générique” from the French film Ascenseur pour l’échafaud. The “cool” just seeps out of these songs, float through the air and pour into your skin, making you feel at ease in a room that should be filled with tension.
Once again, if you’re not a fan of Jazz, this might be the album for you to try. There’s nothing too sappy and there’s nothing that’s too free form that might make one think that these guys are just plunking out notes and going nowhere. This stuff is tight and hip.
If you are a Jazz fan, surely you know Davis’ work and know what you’re getting: great stuff to entertain a dinner crowd or for a romantic evening for two.
I think it would’ve been nice if there had been something with a little more of his funk on this disc and maybe skip the Lauper tune, but everything else on this nearly 70 minute CD plays real sweet.
Favorite Song: “So What”
Genre: Cool Jazz
Sounds Like: A soulful, unforgettable evening in a hot club with your sultry lover.
