Miles Davis – The Complete Birth Of The Cool

Let me tell you, I was very hesitant to believe all the hate for this pressing. And on first listen I thought it was good. Obviously not great since the material wasn't audiophile to begin with. But hey, for the price you get a Stoughton jacket, the album, and a cool concert. That's very hard to up and I don't regret it. I also had a chance to get a Classic Records pressing for a damn good price and wanted to see if all the talk about it was true. For lack of a better word, holy shit it's not even close. The Classic is an entirely new beast that it feels like a different album entirely. It has a high-end sparkle that's never graining and a low-end that never muddies up any of the air. I rarely ever am completely astounded by an audiophile pressing compared to its standard counterpart, but all the praise it gets is warranted. Please seek it out. I just wish the price was at all comparable to that of this pressing.

One of the worst masterings I encountered in a while! Muffled, lifeless, no fun at all. Even half the price isn't worth it, as you'll never play it. Every standard CD version (I got one for 1 buck recently) sounds miles more alive and sparkling.

Birth of the Cool was my first entree to Miles Davis and years later I even played in a West Coast jazz ensemble that performed several of these (quite difficult but brilliant) arrangements. From '49, early Miles plays exactly like later Miles, just without his trademark harmon mute, lol. Mulligan is lively, but the real MVP is Lee Konitz (on alto sax) who rips like a beast but has the tone of a soft little bird.

I paid a for a sealed copy, which has a perimeter warp on D1. The sound is decent for the vintage but I must say I was expecting the remaster to be an improvement over the late 90's CD version I last purchased. It's just OK. Also, on side A, the label placement allows the needle to dig right into the label in the dead wax. Boo.

The second disc is not highly listenable but it is still interesting to hear the radio broadcast of some of these charts in their early play thru, with slightly different personnel.

The gatefold sleeve and integral booklet are beautiful, as good as it gets, complete with a wonderful portrait of Miles on the back page. Nice job.

This gets 3 stars.

We have a winner here; a nice classy replication of the original 57’ release (both in physicality and sonically), essential extras (the essay is indispensable, while the live disc satisfies a “completist’s” needs), and a very solid pressing quality.

This new mastering comes close enough to the original Capitol “D-1’s” in tone and color, but with greater detail and separation revealed around the instruments, and with a deeper, dimensional, “Mono depth” (something I can’t recall the originals having to this extent). The low end is still quite natural sounding here on this new vinyl cut (without sounding too modern or boomy like most new remasters tend to), while the cymbals have never been more detailed, separated, and present. I have owned all D-1, D-2, D-3 (Canadian version), D-6, and N1 runnout variations (there was even a D-4 for the Japanese marketplace), and this new remaster (sonically) lands right in between the D-1’s and D-3’s. The D-1’s were always the most “airy” sounding, while the other D’s were either cut louder (like the D-6), or with a more pronounced low end (the N’s are the least desirable—they have a blurred “imaging” quality to them). I also had the “Classic Records” Audiophile version of this title, and the level of tape-hiss heard on their enhancement of the album I found distracting at best (on at least a few tracks). I can’t imagine another attempt (reissue/remaster) being made at this record in the near future, this package is it, and it is the very definition of, “cool”.

With all of that said, there is still a certain charm that my original D-1 possesses, a nostalgic “old-timey” quality that I can’t seem to part with, even though I think this new release is indeed a better listen. Part of the definition of “cool” is “something that never goes out of style”, no matter what current trends may be, and with a classic like “Birth Of The Cool”, my inclination is that after 60 some-odd years, well, the original 57’ is still cool with me…😎