The six tracks in 76 minutes that comprise We Want Miles were taken from recordings on US and Japanese tours in 1981 (I love how Recorded "Live" gets those air quotes on the album, so possibly brushed up in the studio, but that's all fine and commonplace). The first LP of the original set is bookended by long and short versions of Jean-Pierre, a really nice earwormy take on what is apparently a French nursery rhyme, with just enough of a discordant rendering to give it an idiosyncratic edge. In between, Miles' 1981 band turns up the heat for a couple of more firey jams, with Mike Stern sounding like a particularly spicy rock-jazz guitarist, and the presence of Al Foster providing a link back to the mid-70s fusion era.
Sides three and four of the original release, each containing a single track, are even better. First we get a 20-minute callback all the way to Porgy & Bess in My Man's Gone Now, but of course with the sound unmistakably rooted in the early 80s. It's a fantastic, slowly unfolding exploration of the classic tune and a definite high point of the album. Lastly, a lengthy improv named for its venue (the Kix club in Boston) takes in old-style walking blues, a slight reggae lilt and brings it all bang up to date (for '81). All in all, a really good album that showed Miles revitalised for having taken time off in the back half of the 70s.
pw: sgtg
