Heavy Metal Miles: Rare Davis Metal Spine Box Sets Available Again...

The widely acclaimed and highly collectable Miles Davis Series multi-CD box sets on Columbia/Legacy sets which were first launched in 1996 and featured a substantial amount of previously unreleased music in a deluxe book style package which featured innovative and eye-catching metal spines, are available again in limited quantities. The series, which was the first to explore and expose the huge amount of unreleased Miles’ music in the vaults, ran from 1996 to 2007 and featured eight titles focussing on different periods of Davis’ Columbia career, winning eight Grammy awards, attracting widespread critical acclaim and bringing some of the most vital albums of the trumpeter’s life to a much wider audience since he died in 1991. They can also now been seen as major building blocks in the ascent of the Miles Davis legacy industry, which has subsequently achieved considerable growth and worldwide exposure with the Miles Davis Bootleg Series box sets, individual anniversary packages, live videos and films, including the recent Birth Of the Cool documentary, as well as numerous books, and exhibitions of his prolific artwork. Importantly they gave Miles aficionados a hitherto unavailable deep dive into the archives illustrating the creative process in the studio of many of his most iconic releases, with valuable alternate versions, much lengthier takes from which producer Teo Macero would edit and sometimes recompose the final version, and a significant number of pieces that were rumoured, but previously unheard.

The series, which has long been out of print in this format and sells for considerably more than the original price on the collector’s market, was initiated with Miles Davis Gil Evans – The Complete Columbia Studio Recordings, a six CD set covering Miles Ahead, Porgy And Bess, Sketches Of Spain, and Quiet Nights together with over 80 outtakes, unreleased compositions and studio chatter and discussions, including the much rumoured but unreleased 12 minute piece ‘Time Of The Barracudas’. All tracks had been remastered and restored from the original multi-tracks, and the deluxe packaging was both innovative and highly immersive with the stout book style holder that bound in the discs and 100 page book finished with a 1¼ inch brass spine that was a engraved with Miles name and a floral design that was a replica of his custom made trumpet. This set won three Grammy Awards alone, with the series going on to win a total of eight Grammys.

The other seven sets followed this pattern, each including from three to seven CDs and a book, all with contrasting metal spines, except The In A Silent Way box, and include; The Complete Columbia Recordings with John Coltrane (6 CD); The Complete 1965-68 Quintet Recordings (6 CD); The Complete Bitches Brew Sessions ( 4 CD); Seven Steps: The Complete Columbia Recordings of Miles Davis 1963-1964 (7 CD); The Complete Jack Johnson Sessions (5 CD);The Complete On The Corner Sessions (6 CD); The Complete In A Silent Way Sessions (3 CD). These are now available in limited quantities only from the official Miles Davis store www.milesdavisstore.com with prices ranging from $39.98 to $79.98 A percentage of each purchase will be donated to the Global FoodBanking Network.