The best-selling Jazz album to date. A masterpiece that is more than just a bunch of songs collected on an album. Indeed, it's much more than that. Kind of Blue is exactly as it details- a kind of blue. A kind of blue that everyone else perceives differently. Your blue isn't my blue, but I can surely tell you the blue that most see on this record is the most beautiful shade of them all. In fact, it's turned into the best selling record of its kind...and for good reason.
If any single element that composes this record were to be missing, it would remove the spirit. Every soul that laid a hand on their instrument created a truly magical atmosphere. Every hit from Jimmy Cobb pounds on your heart and soul. Every pluck on the bass by Paul Chambers leads you into a unique trance. Every key danced upon by Bill Evans leaves you swinging to the rhythm, and every note spurted by Davis colors the soul a different shade of blue.
From the haunting melody of "So What" to the soft emotional ballad that is "Blue in Green"... this record is, in a sense, manipulating. Jazz is hypnotic. Somehow it seems the fabric of music was torn by the beautiful material produced on this album. Miles and the crew accomplished the feat of making you create your own visual spectrum by listening to this record. Millions of albums were sold and millions of albums changed people.
Miles would continue to change lives, and jazz, through music on later releases, but Kind of Blue was obviously the bait that pulled people into his trance. Kind of Blue was and is one of the most influential and important albums of all time by one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century.
This masterpiece isn't just audible, but visible, in the way you can sense the musicians doing what they do best...making you feel. And that, my friends, is the beautiful thing about music- the ability to create and feel new moods with each track.
Happy birthday to Miles Davis, and may he rest in peace.
-Ethan Blackburn
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