Six Degrees of "Nefertiti"

"Unsettling" is the word frequently used to describe Nefertiti, which doesn't sound like high praise — until you hear the record. This is arguably Miles Davis's greatest quintet in full creative flower, working organically to undo contented preconceptions and status-quo predictability.

It was an unsettling time. Davis's dear friend and cohort, the iconic saxophonist John Coltrane, died two days before four of these ten tracks were recorded. One of those songs, Herbie Hancock's "Riot," was recorded between race riots in Newark and Detroit, which left dozens dead and hundreds injured in that July of 1967.

But it was Wayne Shorter's title track that caused the biggest upheaval in jazz circles, flipping the traditional roles of the "front line" horns and supporting rhythm section. On "Nefertiti," Shorter's tenor and Miles's trumpet keep the time through a doleful melodic refrain (or "ostintato"), while Tony Williams becomes the alpha dog (and the Rosa Parks of drummers, no longer deferential at the back of the band), unleashing a series of brilliant, dynamic lead patterns on his kit that still resonate more than 40 years later.

Nefertiti is also Miles's most subtle personal triumph. He didn't write any of the six songs (though all are original compositions from other band members), solos infrequently and issues his trademark, confident bleat only on "Pinocchio" (although his aching intro on "Madness" is his most memorable passage). Since completing the quintet with Shorter two years earlier, however, Miles felt he had the personnel to forge a middle ground between "free jazz" and bebop. This fourth album in that group's two-year span is in many respects the apex of that "freebop" hybrid; a cool, acoustic, prismatic music that sizzles and pulsates via Williams' endlessly innovative effusions, bassist Ron Carter's penetrating pulse (check him on "Hand Jive" or the harsh pizzicato of "Riot") and Herbie Hancock's elliptical yet forceful piano lines and comping. Add in Davis' restraint and the dark-toned, judicious contributions of Shorter, and you've got five sage masters capable of improvising rather than abandoning or embracing structure, creating impressionistic textures that seethe or waft, that have the beguiling, bristling balance and force of a gentle martial art, like tai chi.

Nefertiti was the last official quintet release before Miles began to delve into electronic instrumentation and eventually inject more rock energy into the freebop model. With the exception of the "Pinocchio" alternate, the bonus tracks are valuable, especially the second alternative of "Hand Jive," another great showcase for Tony Williams.

Weather Report co-leaders Joe Zawinul and Wayne Shorter both contributed mightily to the metamorphoses of Miles's music in the late-'60s. So why is Night Passage — the group's ninth record, released in 1980 — their most Nefertiti-like effort?

Because after the overwhelming commercial success of the single "Birdland" and the disco-fied excess of Mr. Gone, the band was grooved out and craving a return to jazz sophistication. Because monster bassist Jaco Pastorius had been around long enough to integrate, and the addition of drummer Peter Erskine and percussionist Robert Thomas gave them a rhythm section that could "freebop" in fusion.

In any case, Night Passage shares Nefertiti's subtle overtones and sense of suspended animation. Pastorius plays the Tony Williams role of kinetic catalyst stepping out from the rhythm section, but more important than those pyrotechnics is Shorter's reengagement, from his gorgeous (and self-effacing) horn work on the title track to his composition "Port of Entry," which juxtaposes his soprano with Jaco's bumpity beats. There's also a winsome cover of Ellington's "Rockin' In Rhythm" to show how far from the swing tradition WR (and Nefertiti-era Miles) had evolved.

They dubbed Tortoise "post-rock," but of course so was Miles, who clearly influenced John McEntire and his Chicago colleagues. This is most apparent via the dreamy and yet purposefully sophisticated TNT, which is less ambient and tinker-toy oriented than their first couple of discs. The inclusion of jazzbo guitarist Jeff Parker, the fact that McEntire is a drummer who isn't afraid to let the beats be the soloist and, of course, trumpeter Rob Mazurek all serve to further the Miles vibe. The title track and "Jetty" are the closest points of comparison, but the entire record — as thematically seamless and varied as a five-mile walk — bears Nefertiti's prevailing sense of abeyance and irresolution, albeit one that might be fortified with morphine and marijuana.

Miles has established a beachhead of sorts in Norway, where not only Molvaer and his crew but another trumpeter and austere electronica-jazz ensemble, Arve Henriksen and Supersilent, reside. Born in 1960, Molvaer is the more club-oriented musician, playing and programming tunes that variously recall trip-hoppers Morcheeba and Portishead, techno-thrashers the Prodigy, and, more to the point here, the gauzy jazz of early Weather Report and Miles circa In A Silent Way. An American Compilation is as it says, some scoops from his European catalogue, including remixes of songs from his first two albums on ECM.

The live material (especially "Water" and "Kakonita") are more spare, more arresting and, not coincidentally, more indebted to Miles. Molvaer neatly captures two of Miles's signature trumpet synonyms — bereft and sinuous — and while his ensemble seemingly aims to be a chilly dance band more often than not as the remixes shapeshift as seamlessly as the seasons, the cerebrally inclined will find plenty of places to ponder.

Eschewing the mystery and sonic koans of Nefertiti, Birds of Fire would rather stomp the throttle and let John McLaughlin's axe shred not only the jazz-rock fusion of Bitches Brew but prog-rock wailers like Yes's Steve Howe. So, aside from guitarist and leader McLaughlin being yet another Davis band alumnus (including Bitches Brew) and penning a song here entitled "Miles Beyond," what's the connection?

Turning the drummer loose. Just as Nefertiti showcased how uniquely energizing it was to unfurl a dynamo like Tony Williams out front, Mahavishnu would be a radically different outfit were it not for the tommy-gun snare beats of Billy Cobham. The breakneck solos from violinist Jerry Goodman and keyboardist Jan Hammer, if not from McLaughlin himself, would sound like mere wankery without Cobham already having blazed the trail. His dot-matrix artillery fire provides the blueprint and context for classics like "One Word" and the title song. Like Nefertiti, Birds of Fire doesn't, as the expression goes, "give the drummer some." The drummer is the one doling it out.

If Miles were alive with his wits still about him, it is easy to imagine him turning out something like Junk Magic. The seven numbers here are generally more "free" than "bop" but never lost or unmoored; they're loyal to Miles's continual quest for that third rail, for strikingly original music that nevertheless beguiles and bewitches. The quartet includes a horn (tenor Aaron Stewart), percussion (Bad Plus drummer Dave King), strings (violist Mat Manieri) and keyboards (the leader Craig Taborn), but a lot of their output is programmed and/or electronically altered. The mood can morph from slapstick to symphonic. "Shining Through" has the layered colors and impulsive tempos of much contemporary classical music. "Prismatica" starts with a boppish horn phrases burping through the gadgetry, like a radio signal between stations, then begins to lock in place like pieces in a jigsaw puzzle. "Bodies At Rest And In Motion" does indeed vary from clump-and-thud to burnished exhalations — segueing into the harsh-toned snippet, "Stalagmite." The 11-minute finale opens like an orchestra tuning their instruments onstage before a concert, but gradually gathers and deepens into cavernous, lush, and stately passages. Only later do you realize that most of the songs are anti-entropy — they progress to coalesce — and that the long final song is entitled "The Golden Age." But it's still unsettling.