Miles Davis
Big Fun

Columbia Records PG_32866 2LP 1974 (Canada)

Big Fun presents music from three different phases of Miles Davis's early-seventies "electric" period.

Sides one and four ("Great Expectations/Orange Lady" and "Lonely Fire") were recorded three months after the Bitches Brew sessions and incorporate sitar, tambura, tabla, and other Indian instruments. They also mark the first time since the beginning of Miles Davis's electric period that he played his trumpet with the Harmon mute which had been one of his hallmarks, making it sound much like the sitar. This contributed to creating a very clear and lean sound, highlighting both the high and low registers, as opposed to the busier sound of Bitches Brew which placed more emphasis on the middle and low registers.

"Ife" was recorded after the 1972 On the Corner sessions, and the framework is similar to tracks from that record. It has a drum and electric bass groove (which in fact at one point breaks down due to mistiming) and a plethora of musicians improvising individually and in combinations over variations on the hypnotic bassline.

Tracklist
A Great Expectations
Bass – Ron Carter
Bass [Fender] – Harvey Brooks
Bass Clarinet – Bennie Maupin
Drums – Billy Cobham
Electric Guitar – John McLaughlin
Electric Piano – Chick Corea, Herbie Hancock
Percussion – Airto Moreira
Sitar [Electric], Tambura – Bihari Sharma, Khalil Balakrishna
Soprano Saxophone – Steve Grossman
Trumpet – Miles Davis
27:34
B Ife
Bass – Michael Henderson
Clarinet, Flute – Bennie Maupin
Drums – Al Foster, William Hart*
Percussion [African] – Mtume*
Piano – Lonnie Smith
Piano, Sitar – Harold "Ivory" Williams
Soprano Saxophone – Carlos Garnett
Soprano Saxophone, Flute – Sonny Fortune
Tabla – Badal Roy
Trumpet – Miles Davis
21:33
C Go Ahead John
Bass – Dave Holland
Drums – Jack DeJohnette
Guitar – John McLaughlin
Saxophone – Steve Grossman
Trumpet – Miles Davis
28:26
D Lonely Fire
Bass – Dave Holland
Bass [Fender] – Harvey Brooks
Bass Clarinet – Bennie Maupin
Drums – Billy Cobham, Jack DeJohnette
Electric Piano – Chick Corea
Electric Piano , Organ [Farfisa] – Joe Zawinul
Instruments [Indian] – Airto Moreira, Khalil Balakrishna
Saxophone – Wayne Shorter
Trumpet – Miles Davis
21:21

Cover [Cover Art] – Corky McCoy
Engineer – Frank Laico (tracks: A), Stan Tonkel (tracks: B to D)
Photography By – Swing Journal Co., Ltd., Japan
Producer – Teo Macero
Remix – John Guerriere, Russ Payne, Stan Weiss
Written-By – Miles Davis

The album catalog number is PG 32866. Record #1 catalogs number is C 32867. Record #2 catalogs numbers is C 32868.

Columbia 6-eye logo on vinyl

inside gatefold and on vinyl: Manufactured by Columbia Records of Canada, Ltd.

2 X Vinyl is VERY GOOD, Side 1 has some visible marks with minimal effect on play, Side 2 has heat stippling, in plastic inner sleeves in a gatefold picture sleeve in GOOD condition (ring and edge wear)

Note About Shipping To The U.S.
We are located in Canada, but have registered ourselves on eBay.com instead of eBay.ca because it gives us significantly better global exposure.  The problem with this is that eBay wants us to charge shipping appropriate to US, where media mail and other options make for fairly reasonable delivery costs. We tried it for a while but ended up losing money on shipping or having to cancel the orders because we couldn't afford to ship for those rates. To manage this we have set the US shipping to run a calculator based on an American location (we chose Plattsburgh as fairly close) and charging according to UPS pricing.  This avoids the cancellation issue, but appears to the buyer to be a prohibitive shipping cost and misrepresents the shipping as being only expedited. If you give us your postal code we will see if we can offer a more reasonable option, but generally we can get a single LP by air to most places in the continental US for $11, a few bucks less for ground.
Thanks for shopping Sir Helmitt,
Jeff Green, e-sales

Powered by
The free listing tool. List your items fast and easy and manage your active items.