Birth Of The Cool

I really liked this. Well, by liked, I mean tolerated it. Well, by tolerated it, I mean I would rather have my eyeballs injected with spider eggs, whilst having by pubes yanked out by an aggressive Bulgarian dinner lady, all the while a parrot is screeching "Jordan Henderson is the best in the world" down my ear, with every woman I've ever fancied and my family and friends all watching on; than ever listen to a single second of this ever again.

I know I am biased here because I really do love Miles Davis and a lot of his "cool jazz" contemporaries and artists that followed their lead, and I am also influenced by the music reviews of the time that likened this album and similar works to impressionist-style visual arts, but, what the heck, I'll embrace it all. This album is gorgeous. The layers, textures, colors...man. I love to imagine what it would be like to find a little time-space portal to loop back to NYC in the late 40s through early 60s when so much amazing jazz was happening. I love this album. Such art.

'The Birth of Cool' reminds me of when I spent my forties as an adult baby. We would meet up in groups of 12-15 and our mums would feed us milk, hug us and change our nappies. I would often piss and shit myself for real, which was a source of such joy for both me and the mums. I was thrown out in disgrace after an incident. I suggested, or more tried to force myself up one of the mums, so I could be reborn. Please understand that this was not sexual, I was merely trying to understand how it would feel to be born, to experience the journey from the womb, through the vagina and into the world, all with the awareness of an adult. Needless to say, the police were called in, the adult baby centre was shut down and I served 18 months in prison.

They don’t call this Birth of the Cool for nothing. What a fucking classic

Feels like you should have a cigar and a whisky. Very smooth

Too hip. Possibly in my top five all time jazz albums. Responsible for a whole subgenre full of bad imitators but, both as the wellspring of an aesthetic and as a standalone collection of music, this is crazy good

Miles Davis is probably the single most talented musician to have lived in the 20th century, well known for occasionally blowing open the entire genre he worked in and inspiring dozens if not hundreds of imitators. For any other musician, this would be their masterpiece - for Davis, it barely cracks the top ten.

3.3 - I suppose context is everything - whereas I've found other Miles Davis albums groundbreaking, to my ears this sounds like laid back big band jazz. Certainly "cool" and pleasant but I'm not feeling that sense of awe and excitement that I'm probably supposed to.

Just cool.

Good ass jazz

Can't say no to some more Miles. I can definitely tell that this came before Kind of Blue. The songs are shorter, less exploratory and experimental. Still, there are flashes here and there that bear the Miles Davis edge, like the end of "Moon Dreams." I was about to say I'm not feeling as jazzed by this, then "Budo" hit me like ONE TWO THREE HO! This is great, and a welcome reprieve from the middling selections last week. Favorite tracks: Budo, Move, Moon Dreams. Album art: Like Kind of Blue, this cover is unimaginative. Granted, it's 1957. But it's a black and white photo of Miles Davis. I do like the angle of the photo and the framing of text all around the picture. As far as '50s jazz album covers go, this one's not bad. 4/5

Jazz melts in to the bakground and disapears, to me. I reallice that this is god jazz, but i cant rember anything from listening to this record.

I love when I see an album that can be pointed to and say "Right here. That's where it all started." What a cool formative moment in jazz history, and not to mention its fucking BALLER. The head for Budo always slaps, and the ending section of Moon Dreams slays me every time.

This is a very pleasant jazz album, and I’m actually really excited to see something from the 50s come up. I don’t think I had ever really listened to any Miles Davis before, although I’d heard lots about him.

EYE POP EMOJI

Smooth. Really enjoyed this. Godchild is the best of the album for me. I like the low bass intro.

One of his very best

Fantastic album, completely different from what I would normally listen to but enjoyed it a lot.

Walk into a random jazzclub across the globe and there's a good chance that the orchestra playing is still trying to mimic the sound and atmosphere created on Birth of the Cool. With one collection of songs, bebop was surpassed by cool jazz, and smoke-filled venues never looked back. Highlights were 'Venus de Milo', 'Godchild' and 'Boplicity', but everything was just cool as heck.

Ok, now this was truly Cool. A smooth set of tracks. I can get behind this Miles, and listening to this might be a better entry point than the other 2 I've had on the list so far.

I am by no means qualified nor worthy to do justice to any sort of review of this album (as if I am of any of the other albums). But here it goes. This is a compilation of 11 tracks recorded by Davis' nonet (nine musicians) over three sessions between 1949 and 1950. The music was a major development in post-bebop jazz. Bebop is 1940's jazz with a fast tempo, complex chord progressions and changes of key. There are several songs that fit maybe more into the bebop fast tempo area. On the flipside is cool jazz which is a more relaxed tempo and this album is credited with starting this cool jazz movement. A number of songs fall in this category. One of the innovative arrangements used on this album is polyphony which is two or more independent melody lines. Again, multiple examples of this throughout the album. There is a lot more history and in-depth breakdown to this album and music but the above-mentioned musical techniques are the ones I found to standout while listening. This is another album with really not a bad song to choose. The first song is "Move" and it does just that rolling along fitting maybe more in the bebop category. A good example of the polyphony with multiple melodies. "Jeru" and "Venus De Milo" are slower tempo, definitely cool jazz. "Jeru" also has a couple outstanding horn solos. I learned a lot from this album. Definitely a good album to chill to. I'm sure to get more jazz and Miles in this challenge and it'll be interesting to see the differences. I'm sure to learn more.

Not often a claim like this can be actually backed up, but this seems to do so. A really solid album from someone who seems to have defined and redefined jazz over and over for others to follow behind him.

I need more Miles Davis in my life.

I'm a huge Miles Davis fan, and jazz of this era in general. This album came two years before Kind of Blue, and it has such a different vibe. The songs are short, and the album is short too. It doesn't have the long solos I'm used to in a Davis album. It's all about the band playing together, and not about Davis in particular. It's a very sweet and complicated at the same time. This is such a good recording too. I really loved this album, but I'm likely to give all Davis albums of this era a 5.

It's interesting to understand that "Birth of the Cool" is a compilation and not an album per se. Comprised of songs recorded in three sessions during 1949 and early 1950, it's a record that shows the evolution of cool jazz, a style being molded on the go with different session bands full of musicians that would make history or were already doing so. Max Roach, Gerry Mulligan, Kenny Clarke, Lee Konitz and John Lewis all have great contributions on this release, showing that Miles Davis was not only a great musician, but also great at chosing his band. It's an 11 track compilation with 11 pieces of jazz history put together.

Canciones cortas, album corto. Cool indeed. Easy to listen to. Escuchá con Edgard.

Not a big jazz guy, but this was a good listen, know there's more Miles to come on this album journey so looking forward to that

Miles Davis invented Cool Jazz, a Jazz genre that tried to be relaxed and "cool" and the way he did it, it was really cool. This album here is a compilation of many songs recorded between 1949 and 1959 and released back then on singles or EPs. But it still was an important release, 7 years later as this not only gave a whole other light on Miles Davis and his artistry but also on Cool Jazz at its rise to stardom. The songs are a mix of Cool Jazz improvs with Bebop as the pillar for these songs. And while it isn't his best album, many still see it as a classic Jazz record to this very day. The album is opened with 'Move' which isn't much Cool Jazz at all but mainly just a really groovy Bebop tune that really goes out with the energetic mood while still being nice, warm and full of mellow tones. It's a lovely first song with many great moments and improvisations and although I much prefer longer Jazz recordings, these short tunes here are still really good. This is an absolutely incredible track right off the bat. To me, 'Jeru' starts off by sounding a lot like a christmas song but I don't know why I think that. It's a pretty nice Cool Jazz song that does tune down the very energetic performance of the first track and adds a nice Hard Bop groove to it instead. It's a beautiful track and while it isn't as good as 'Move', it still has some great improvs throughout which makes it a great song in my book. 'Moon Dreams' sounds pretty similar to something you'd might hear Mingus do somewhere in "The Black Saint a.t.S.L.". Mainly because both are very influenced by the Third Stream genre which combines Jazz and elements of Classical music. And this Cool Jazz approach to it is something really relaxing and moving. Miles Davis really puts all of his soul into this song and while a couple parts do feel a little off, others really take the spotlight. It's a great song through and through. The groovy Bebop returns with 'Venus de Milo' and this time it's mixed with Miles very well performed Cool Jazz improvs. It's a lovely track and actually one of the most consistent and best working moments on the entire record. It's not perfect but really close with the only thing holding it back being a couple of other improvs from other players that aren't quite on the same level. 'Budo' is just plain Bebop and one of the three songs composed by Miles himself. This was still pretty early in his career so he obviously didn't compose one of his greatest pieces but it's still pretty solid. It is one of the weaker tracks on the album but it's still far from bad. It mainly feels unfocused and out of touch with itself and like it moves around aimlessly. But that doesn't mean that it doesn't have some really nice moments on it. The albums first half is closed with 'Deception' which is another mix of different genres but this time it doesn't really work. It is again composed by Miles himself and again, it moves around without going anywhere. This time it's actually quite "annoying" because it builds up to nothing, it is unstructured and not the "Avant-Garde" good way. It's just not that great overall. It's good but much closer to being average than great. 'Godchild' opens the albums second side and while some moments like the start do also feel pretty unstructured, it does find itself after a couple of movements and turns actually pretty solid and consistent after that. It's got some really nice moments throughout and I really like the way some parts are performed. It's an absolutely incredible track. The last song composed by Miles is 'Boplicity' which in comparison feels weak and basic. It is structured much better and it goes somewhere at least but the performances are really weak and standard. It's not bad but I think that it's not much more than a good piece with a couple of really well made moments namely the Miles solo halfway through. The more up-beat performance of 'Rocker' isn't really Rocker because it's Jazz but it's still nice to listen to. It's structured really well but some performances lack the interesting parts that would make them stick out. It's pretty standard and basic but it doesn't feel like you could pull out much more, so it's okay. A couple of Big Band influences are present on 'Israel' which again isn't that special. It has some nice moments and some good performances but as a whole it feels a little bit dull and unfinished and more like a quick session than a finished work. 'Rouge' finishes the album with another high quality song that really works within the album especially as it is the closing track. It's nice that he ended the album with a great song like this, full of beautiful moments and performances. An incredible song to finish a diverse but well made compilation with. favourites: Move, Rouge, Godchild, Venus de Milo, Moon Dreams least favourites: Deception, Rocker, Israel Rating: strong 7 to light 8 https://rateyourmusic.com/~Emil_ph for more ratings, reviews and takes

Saw Miles Davis live during his Bitches Brew album tour In 1970 at the Filmore West In San Francisco opening for the Grateful Dead we were tripping and they took us to another planet musically and the Dead spent his whole set leaning on the back of the amps completely mesmerized While not Bitches Brew still it’s Miles Davis so a solid 4 for me

If peeing your pants is cool, then I'm Miles Davis.

Shorter jazz compositions when cool jazz was just emerging. This is the peak of music of the era and so I would have to give it 4 stars. However, jazz still has quite a journey to go, and Davis has yet to attain his zenith of creativity. I don't think the shorter pieces work well with the genre.

Jazz. Seems cool. Easy to listen to, I guess.

No. 86/1001 Move 3/5 Jeru 3/5 Moon Dream 3/5 Venus De Milo 4/5 Budo 3/5 Deception 3/5 Godchild 3/5 Boplicity 4/5 Rocker 4/5 Israel 3/5 Rogue 3/5 Average: 3,27 Good jazz album, not my favorite from Mr. Davis.

More enjoyable than Bitches Brew, less exciting than Kind of Blue.

Probably the least remarkable Miles Davis we have listened to on this list so far. 2/5

What a talent. Imagine being able to play that much trumpet while smacked out of your eyeballs? It should be a lesson to all these namby pamby modern rock'n' rollers, get off the 'gram and get on the smack.

The essence of chill and relaxation. I wasn’t very familiar with the power of Miles Davis. He will certainly be an artist I will return to in the future.

The first of 1001AYMHBYD's four Miles Davis albums. Not sure I've heard this before, actually. I might have, but it's the one out of the four not in my collection. And not the one I'd bring with me on a lonely island - THE record to bring on my lonely island - but it's superb. As this (Swedish) person has put so succinctly before: "I reallice that this is god jazz" It is indeed. I wonder, though, if I should leave some room in my rating. [...] Nah.

let me just express my gratitude to the curators of this list that the golden era of medium-to-large ensemble jazz, the focus of most of my work as a composer-arranger, is fairly well-represented on it! being a composer-arranger is sort of a (somehow) even dorkier version of being a singer-songwriter, so it's always nice to feel like someone is still in your corner. this is some of the most exemplary bebop of its time, truly making a case for jazz as Black American chamber music. this nonet lineup, owing to its warm brass section from trumpet down to tuba, is very easy on the ears, which allows your ears to hear through the old recording fidelity and straight into the beautiful counterpoint and harmonic motion present in all of these tracks. 75-ish years on, I'm still blown away by the sophistication in these arrangements, the bulk of which are handled by Gerry Mulligan, one of the architects of the "cool jazz" sound. Davis is featured prominently on just about every cut, but there's plenty of space for other soloists, including saxophonists Mulligan and Lee Konitz, trombonist J.J. Johnson, pianist John Lewis and plenty more. Gil Evans also makes two appearances here as an arranger on "Moon Dreams" and "Boplicity", foreshadowing many future successful Davis-Evans collaborations which would take place on a much grander musical scale. this may not go for your jugular like a typical big band record, but what this album lacks in volume and intensity, it brings instead in intrigue. this is music that you can't help but pay close attention to; if you're a writer, you'll listen to this record with equal parts admiration and envy. 10/10.

I love jazz. There's nothing else to say.

“If peeing your pants is cool, consider me Miles Davis” - my mom every time I mention Miles Davis

Just gorgeous.

Loved it, definitely a good night time drive album

Jazz is not one of my top favorite genres, but I loved this album. Its smooth for sure.

10/10. Charted as 'Iconic' or 9.66/10. Every song was added to my playlist. Finding that if there was one musician I had to listen to forever, Miles Davis may be it.

5 estrelas

The literal birth of the post-Bebop movement happens on this record which also kicks off the first of many collaborations between Davis and Gil Evans. This is not my favorite Davis album, but such a key moment in Jazz that it can't be anything less than 5/5.

My favourite jazz album, probably spun in its entirety once a quarter. There isn't a track I dislike - the arrangements are still fresh and interesting today, with nothing overly long or short. Rouge is a particular standout, penned by John Lewis; it never bores me. I've got Louis to thank for introducing me to this album - it is indispensable in the world of jazz!

The birth of peak, miles davis tkm

Groundbreaking sound from Miles and a host of talented jazz musicians, including Max Roach, Lee Konitz, JJ Jonsin and Kai Winding. The nonet shines in tunes such as "Move" and "Venus de Milo".

David always delivers. Great chilling out and drinking a beverage music

This is delightful. Smooth and easy to listen to. Doesn’t amble pointlessly. Jazz-tastic.

This was great. Absolutely loved it.

Amazing, I need to listen to more jazz, loved every song.

Yes

It's Miles Davis what more can I say

Amazing album. Miles Davis has a distinctive musical genius.

amazing album. 9/10

classic! Favorite track: Moon dreams other picks: move, Venus de milo, rocker, boplicity

Album 517 of 1001 Miles Davis - Birth Of The Cool (1957) Rating : 5 / 5 I do love my horns. Some awesome music to begin the day. Again, these older albums rate differently than those that came a few years later. Anytime is a good time for this album. Maybe not a funeral...but I think you know what I'm trying to say.

I love it! Will add it to my music for work playlist

Thank you Miles, very cool!

Epic. GERRY MULLIGAN 🎷

A pure triumph of cool.

Very cool, very cool.

Smooth and fast right out the gate.

Very very good

I'm starting to appreciate Jazz.

Amazing album, beautifully sounded/

Classic jazz album! Crazy to think about what Davis went on to do with Bitches Brew, but can appreciate it all!

Cool jazz. Loveyit!

My ear isn’t tuned for jazz but I can’t imagine it gets any better than this!

Personal enjoyment: 4/5 Relevance to this list: 5/5

Yes, it is Interesting to learn most of them are not Davis' arrangements and that they were all just hanging out. The instrumentation is so unique and lends even more to the lyrical harmonies of the album and the future of Cool Jazz

Embora não seja o tipo de jazz que mais curta nem meu álbum favorito do Miles Davis, acho impossível não dar 5 estrelas para esse disco.

An excellent easy listen. Certainly lives up to being "cool" with its sound. There's inherently something cool about all jazz in my opinion, and this is an excellent showcase of fantastic jazz. A must listen for anyone who appreciates older music

From what I understand, this was a bunch of singles recorded over an extended period of time. And by the time it came out it was already past the height of Cool jazz. This album is very well packaged. The songs work conceptually and play very easily into the others. The band is on fire and Miles is devastatingly good. Also I love the fact that I got jazz on a Friday!

Yup. That is all my friends. Yup.

Love it!

Probably no surprise that I’m at a 5. I’m not gonna be verbose about it: this is a really fucking good jazz album. Every composition here is really well done, and I enjoyed the entire runtime. Not a single lull for me, nor a single miss, or even a single problem with the mixing or production, which is a little wild for a 50s album. I fell into a deep bliss during that, which makes me really terrified for whenever we get Kind of Blue, because this album has already set a high bar for me, and I know the critical acclaim that Kind of Blue has. Regardless, this is just a spectacular album to me, and I’ll easily come back to this often as studying music or reading music. It’s very deserving of a 5.

5 stars by virtue of being miles davis

Coolness abounds indeed!

This is probably the most accessible jazz album from this era that I've listened to. The songs are creative and musically impressive, but without challenging the listener too much with complex time signatures. On here I like Move, Moon Dreams, and Rouge the most.

Wonderful

Not my favourite miles davis album, but still an absolute jazz classic of course. A masterclass in melody and harmony.

The best of all time.

This is an album that does exactly what it says on the tin. Effortlessly cool, without being arch. The recordings on this date from 1949 and 1950 but sound vibrant and fresh. A perfect place to start for anyone who thinks that jazz is not for them.

This is a killer. Definitely cool, insanely good. The truth is, anything Davis did deserves 5 stars.

They don’t call this Birth of the Cool for nothing. What a fucking classic

This probably was the birth of the cool to be fair.

Spectacular.

HE DEFINED COOL.

It’s Miles Davis! If there were 6 stars, I’d award it.

A smooth, beautifully crafted album. A far cry from Miles' more challenging stuff, but infinitely pleasing to the ears. Fave Songs: Moon Dreams, Budo, Move, Rocker, Jeru

Smooth

Very soothing and great jazz!

Wow was that album good

That Miles Davis is something. Perfection. 5/5.

So. Damn. cool. Dreamy, melodic, powerful. Jazz in the days of old Chicago, pencil skirts, and offers you can't refuse.

Landmark album