Way To Go

It may not be as ubiquitous as Kind Of Blue but the Miles Davis album In A Silent Way is another of those that crosses the boundary of appealing to a strictly jazz audience and appears in many a general music collection. By now, the electric nature of the band was well established and it still contained Wayne Shorter on sax, both Herbie Hancock and Chick Corea on electric piano and Dave Holland now on bass guitar providing the rhythm section with the uniquely propulsive Tony Williams on drums. The new boys for the album were Joe Zawinul on electric piano and organ and guitarist John McLaughlin. Something that goes relatively unremarked about this period of Miles's music is that the inclusion of Zawinul, Holland and McLaughlin was the first time that non American players were an influence. The title track itself is a Joe Zawinul composition and it segues into and out of the compositions by Miles himself. The original vinyl album obviously was seperated into two sides but the music can be seen as a continuous evolving piece with long evolving lines, subtle rather than showy soloing and bubbling electric undercurrents. Although electric, it is a restrained record without any loud adrenelin fuelled passages. The start of a funk influence is there but in a laid back mode. And again, despite the electric instrumentation, it has a certain timeless feel.