Miles Ahead : What's with all the random gun toting?

What's with all the random gun toting?

Trailer looks good, but that part confuses me. Is it even based on real events, or just added to make it more exciting?

Re: What's with all the random gun toting?

Snarky reply but maybe Miles was secretly jealous of Phil Spector? If the film is true to life then there probably isn't much but the dark side of a celebrity tormented Miles. Jazzers had worked to develop a high level of musicianship and creativity within a very restricted and narrow genre only to see the music and record business move in a different direction. The irony for Miles was he had lusted for concert hall repectability but then became as culturally irrelevant as modern classical music.

Re: What's with all the random gun toting?

"he irony for Miles was he had lusted for concert hall repectability but then became as culturally irrelevant as modern classical music."

You forgot a word: "pop" culturally irrelevant. Which is to say, lowest common denominator culture. Great music has rarely ever been pop culturally relevant. If that's your only metric, then Katy Perry is the height of relevancy.

Re: What's with all the random gun toting?

The term popular music can mean different things. Katy Perry is relevant to millions of young fans but probably not to discerning listeners It's hard to know what music from the popular genre will be considered "great" in two hundred years. Gershwin's tunes were fairly popular and became useful for improvising musicians. How many pianists want to riff on Bridge Over Troubled Water? It's a modern day hymn that became hugely popular but might not resonate at all with future generations. Simon put his heart in it and Knechtel was at his peak of session call creativity but I have no desire to play the tune at parties nor do I play LET IT BE although I will play Tenderly and go right into Stealing Home by David Foster. Fats Waller's stuff was popular during his time and is now considered quite notable.
Miles envied the players who had a wider audience. That is certainly understandable. He would have loved to have the large following that Prince or Michael Jackson had. That's only normal for most musicians. I think he got over the idea that the concert setting was the end all. Such an exalted venue hardly seems relevant today.

Re: What's with all the random gun toting?

come down to East St. Louis some time and you'll know why GUNS are essential to survival

Re: What's with all the random gun toting?

It would be extremely offensive to his family and close friends if it never happened. I don't know the true story but it should be something similar happened and the movie made it more dramatic.

Re: What's with all the random gun toting?

Credit to the previous poster mentioning Phil Spector. Both men were musical geniuses with major self-esteem issues. Davis was better at hiding it but both had inordinate fixations with firearms. Had Davis lived longer he might currently be sharing a jail cell with Spector.

Re: What's with all the random gun toting?

See the documentary - the Miles Davis Story. A good documentary that covers his life from start to finish. Interviews with his son and nephew and daughter and ex-wife.

Re: What's with all the random gun toting?

It was almost like a Quinton Tarintino movie. I think I would have liked it more if it were fiction!

Actors are useless without the power of a good writer's imagination

Re: What's with all the random gun toting?

all short people have the short people syndrome. When did Miles have guns. You never heard about guns. Cocaine but so what. It's a hell of a drug. Can't get it but... Because the power humans won't let you have any. Because clean clean clean...

Re: What's with all the random gun toting?

Does everyone here realize that the entire story was imagined by Miles during the start and the end of the 30 second interview, which is shown as bookends to the movie?

The "tape" was a symbol for how Miles struggled with the mainstream industry trying to get him to do more "Kind of Blue" type hits when he wanted to go in his own direction.

Notice that the "Rolling Stone" writer was a long haired version of the TV interviewer who fails to get Miles to sit for the interview.

Junior's character was even the young Miles (gifted trumpeter, heroin addict). I loved the scene near the end where old Miles is sitting with young Miles, coaching him on how to build a chord progression in an entirely new way.

Awesome music, fun way to "bounce through the years", inside the mind of someone we all revere. But, not meant to be taken too literally.

Re: What's with all the random gun toting?

Because it's 'Murica!
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