Miles Davis on Steve Miller: “Steve Miller didn’t have his shit going for him, so I’m pissed because I got to open for this non-playing motherfucker just because he had one or two sorry-ass records out. So I would come late and he would have to go on first and then when we got there, we smoked the motherfucking place, and everybody dug it.” http://www.openculture.com/2015/05/miles-davis-opens-for-nei...
I hate this ingratitude. You know Miller and Young loved Davis. Absolutely loved him, but they were in the business of making radio friendly rock music by that time and obviously very different than the jazz scene Davis lived in. Their mainstream popularity gave Davis a great venue to open up to non-jazz listeners and promote someone they admired. Davis, being a jerk himself (oh the irony of calling Miller a jerk), took it as a personal affront to have this opportunity. An opportunity other acts would have killed for.
Life isn't and shouldn't be "everyone is fake except this one true artist here." They're all artists. If Miller could magically become a better musician he would have. He probably felt tremendously upstaged by Young's and Davis' talents. I'm sure hearing this broke his heart.
Miller himself got his early breaks through concerts backed by Chuck Berry in 1960's. I can't imagine him calling Chuck a low talent nobody, even though by then his music was very much out of style as blues-based and psychedelic guitar rock took over. Everyone has to ride someone else's coattails to make it in this industry. No need to be an asshole about it.
you are absolutely right on one level, but to balance it out... really nobody involved really wanted to be at that concert as it was put together... it was purely a put together promotional gig by the record label...
in other words, it wasnt really 'ingratitude' it was literally, i am not grateful because i dont want this.
Back in the day, all major label concerts were products of label management. Headlining artists had some sway to choose openers, but this wasn't an extraordinary event where Davis was hogtied and forced to play at gunpoint. More than likely Young had a hand in this out of mutual respect for Davis' immense talents.
I do see where some coercion was possible, but by 1970 Davis certainly had the political weight to turn this down if he truly didn't want to do it. The reality here is that he was past his heyday in terms of sales by then and probably wanted to revitalize his career by touring with the current popular bands. Birth of the Cool was almost 15 years old by then.
This has to have been written by somebody who only knows of Steve Miller's admittedly bland hits in the middle 70s. He put out 5 remarkably good albums in the late 60s that sold, well, lukewarm at best. It's hard to blame him for realizing that the great stuff he'd been doing wasn't making his retirement secure. Even in coming out with a string of bland big sellers like he did took a degree of talent that most can't even imagine.
If you say this, you've only listened to early 80s Steve Miller. Check out his blues and folk. Lots are up on Youtube. (Which, to the point of the original article, probably doesn't pay him much)
I saw Steve Miller a few years back in concert. I wouldn't have even considered myself a fan before having seen him, but I came away very impressed. I was even dreading "Abracadabra," but so help me that song was great live.
His singing and playing were both spot on. His sound was terrific. I'm a guitar player myself, and the tones he got from his Les Paul and Strat were textbook examples of classic, excellent tone. The band was tight as a band can be. It was a great night of music. The guy is a first rate musician.
I've been watching many of his live performances on YouTube. He's a great musician, who happened to ride the pop wave. We shouldn't judge him just on that. It's like judging the Dead just on "Touch of Grey" or Bowie just "Young American".
Upvoted because you are right. Sometimes we let the work and creative persona of an artist overshadow their flaws. While I still deeply respect Davis the musician (not that he'd care what some white guy thinks), how he treated some of his wives was disgusting.
Related-ish: someone linked to this fantastic read [1] today in some HN thread, and after going through it in awe, I come across the guy's Wikipedia page [2]. Yikes!
Miles was legendarily difficult, but at the time, he had a point. In 1970 he was asked by Clive Davis to go to the Fillmore and open for Steve Miller to support Bitches Brew, which still stands (even among all of Miles' other legendary work) as a controversial classic.
Having listened to the box set of his 1969 live shows [1] a bunch of times -- wow! What a band. It's been almost 50 years and it still sounds fresh and crazy. It is of course in a whole different musical realm than Steve Miller.
