Miles Davis – { feuilleton }

Weekend links 834

A Bigger Splash (1967) by David Hockney.

• I was interviewed this week at Retrofuturista, the first interview I’ve done in a while, and more wide-ranging than they sometimes are. Subjects covered include illustration, design, weird fiction, the Reverbstorm comics, the Bumper Book of Magic, underground culture, and the deficiencies of AI art. Also my ongoing, mostly unseen, Axiom project.

• At Nautilus: Kristen French conducts a lengthy and fascinating interview with Andrew Gallimore and Donald Hoffman, a pair of reseachers seeking to upend theoretical physics by making consciousness the foundation of reality, rather than its inconvenient and inexplicable by-product.

• “My audience is film-smart, and I always say, ‘If they don’t get something, then do your homework.’ Sometimes you have homework when you come to see my movies to figure out what the references are.” John Waters talking to Marya E. Gates at RogerEbert.com.

• The Morgan Library & Museum in NYC launches an exhibition later this month: Tarot! Renaissance Symbols, Modern Visions. At Colossal there’s a look at some of the 20th-century art, while Smithsonian Magazine has a selection of older card designs.

• Inferno by Boards Of Canada is “probably as close to a political statement as these mystery men will ever approach.” Thus Simon Reynolds looking back over the history of the group following the release of their marvellous new album.

• Among the new titles at Standard Ebooks, the home of free, high-quality, public-domain texts: The Necromancers by Robert Hugh Benson.

• New music: Demand To Be Taken To Heaven Alive by Horse Lords; A Wave Of Alarm by Comdex; Teleportations by Danalogue.

• Dennis Cooper’s favourite fiction, poetry, non-fiction, film, art, and internet of 2026 so far. Thanks again for the link here!

• At Public Domain Review: Venetian Bridge Brawls in 17th and 18th Century Art.

• At Door of Perception: Sibylle Ruppert—The Inward Gaze of the Flesh.

• RIP David Hockney and James Blood Ulmer.

• The Strange World of…Melinda Gebbie.

• Splash One (Now I’m Home) (1966) by 13th Floor Elevators | Splash (1968) by Miles Davis | Splash (1974) by Can

Weekend links 830

Plakat Secesyjny (1971), a poster by Hubert Hilscher for an exhibition of Art Nouveau graphics.

• At Public Domain Review: Longitude by Way of Wounded Hounds: Kenelm Digby’s Sympathetick Powder (1669 edition). Two subjects familiar to readers of Thomas Pynchon’s Mason & Dixon.

• Miles Davis and group (Dave Liebman, Pete Cosey, Reggie Lucas, Michael Henderson, Al Foster, James Mtume) live in Stockholm in 1973. TV footage, 56 minutes.

• At the BFI: Rory Doherty selects ten great films about forgers and fakes, while Kazuo Ishiguro compiles a list of his top ten train films.

• At Colossal: “Markus Brunetti’s monumental photos venerate European ecclesiastical landmarks”.

• Font Faces: Nick Shinn answers questions about being a type designer.

• Mix of the week: DreamScenes – May 2026 at Ambientblog.

• Milky Way photographer of the year 2026.

• New music: Chambers by Ruben.

• Train To Ranchipur (1959) by The Markko Polo Adventurers | One Train Load Of Dub (1974) by Tommy McCook & The Observers | Sunstroke / Mind Train (1992) by Sun Dial

In A Silent Way

In A Silent Way (1969) by Miles Davis

• In A Silent Way (YT)

In a Silent Way was assembled from various takes from a three-hour session on February 18, 1969, at CBS 30th Street Studio’s Studio B in Manhattan. “Shhh / Peaceful” was composed solely by Davis, while the opening and closing section to “In a Silent Way / It’s About That Time” is based on [Joe] Zawinul’s “In a Silent Way”, which he would record in its original form in 1970 for his third solo album, Zawinul (1971). After Zawinul presented the tune to the group, it was rehearsed as it was originally written, but Davis wished for it to sound more rock-oriented and stripped the various chord changes to leave a more basic melody built around a pedal point. [John] McLaughlin had some difficulty playing in the manner Davis wished of him, but found his way after the trumpeter suggested he play the guitar as if he were a novice. Davis believed that Zawinul was never happy with his adaptation of “In a Silent Way”, but felt that the album would have been less successful had its original arrangement been kept. Zawinul had expressed some dislike of Davis’ arrangement, in particular of two chords that he believed that Davis was wrong to remove. Zawinul claimed that he was responsible for the melodic bass line and descending melody of “It’s About That Time” but was not credited; he blamed [Teo] Macero for this, as he “always put things together so that it came out as if Miles had written it.” (more)

Zawinul (1971) by Joe Zawinul

• In A Silent Way (YT)

Celebration (1972) by El Chicano

• In A Silent Way (YT)

Live At The Montreux Jazz Festival (1972) by Roy Ayers Ubiquity

• In A Silent Way (Should really be titled It’s About That Time since Ayers is playing the second part of the Davis piece) (YT)

Filmore – The Last Days (1972) by Various Artists

• In A Silent Way by Santana (YT)

Double Exposure (1975) by Nat Adderley

• In A Silent Way (YT)

Concerto Retitled (1976) by Joe Zawinul

• In A Silent Way (YT)

Babel (1978) by Max

• D’Una Manera Silenciosa (YT)

Continue reading “In A Silent Way”

Weekend links 729

Phosphorus and Hesperus (1881) by Evelyn De Morgan.

• Mix of the week, or possibly the entire year: The Deep Ark, 167 tracks (over 8 hours of music), most of which are from the electronic deluge of the early 1990s. The download link may not work for all browsers—it didn’t for one of mine—but it is active. Via Simon Reynolds who has more about the Deep Ark project.

• At Nautilus: Betsy Mason on the use of stage magic to investigate animal behaviour. “By performing tricks for birds, monkeys, and other creatures, researchers hope to learn how they perceive and think about their world.”

• At The Daily Heller: Mad and the Usual Gang of Idiots. Meanwhile, Mr Heller’s font of the month may prove useful for this election season, a Jonathan Barnbrook design named Moron.

Looking back, you can see a pattern in those eras in which interest in telepathy boomed. Coined by Myers and his fellow psychical researchers in the 1880s, telepathy gained traction because it was formulated inside a moment of scientific and technological revolution, where uncanny transmissions proliferated across the visible and invisible spectrum, seeming to collapse the natural and the supernatural together. In the 1970s, telepathy returned, if under different names, as part of another moment of crisis. The Cold War arms race was an essential part of this, feeding a strange supplemental world of fantasy technologies, from mind control to brainwashing, and playing on an all-too-widespread psychological paranoia around being seen, infiltrated and manipulated by invisible agents.

Roger Luckhurst looks back at a century of psychic research

• New music: Portable Reality Generator by Field Lines Cartographer, and Sublime Eternal Love by Chrystabell and David Lynch.

• Coffee and Chocolates for Two Guitars: Robert Fripp interviewing John McLaughlin in July, 1982.

• Paintings by Ithell Colquhoun currently showing at the Ben Hunter gallery, London.

• At Public Domain Review: Eye Miniatures (ca. 1790–1810).

• ESP (1965) by Miles Davis | ESP (1990) by Deee-lite | ESP (2002) by Comets On Fire

Weekend links 727

Untitled (Hand-Shell) (1934) by Dora Maar.

• “The Secret Public…reads like the book he was born to write…and speaks to the taboo around homosexuality which the bravest pop stars did their best to dispel.” Alex Needham reviewing The Secret Public: How LGBTQ Resistance Shaped Popular Culture (1955–1979) by Jon Savage. Anyone buying the book should also find themselves a copy of Savage’s Queer Noises compilation.

• At Dangerous Minds: Richard Metzger advises everyone to seek out Sion Sono’s 237-minute Love Exposure (2008), “Japan’s eroto-theosophical answer to the allegorical journeys of Alejandro Jodorowsky”.

• Prince – Sign O’ The Times (Live at Paisley Park 12/31/87). Pro-shot video of the last performance of the Sign O’ The Times tour, with a unique contribution from Miles Davis.

• Old music: Camembert Electrique by Gong. A rocking riposte to the stereotype of the group as a bunch of whimsical hippies.

• New music: Lambda by ZULI. This is another release on the Subtext label which I designed.

• The Devil in the Flesh: Patrick Clarke on David Sylvian’s Red Guitar at 40.

• Milky Way photographer of the year 2024.

• The Strange World of…Gastr del Sol.

• Jungle Guitar (1961) by The Palatons | Lunatic Guitar (1980) by Ippu-Do | Naive Guitar (1982) by Adrian Belew