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Buddy Miles | |
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 Miles performing in Germany, 1972 | |
| Background information | |
| Born | George Allen Miles Jr. (1947-09-05)September 5, 1947 Omaha, Nebraska, U.S. |
| Died | February 26, 2008(2008-02-26) (aged 60) |
| Genres | |
| Occupations |
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| Instruments |
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| Years active | 1959–2008 |
| Labels | |
| Website | www.buddymiles.com |
George Allen "Buddy"Miles Jr. (September 5, 1947 – February 26, 2008) was an American composer, drummer, guitarist, vocalist and producer. He was a founding member ofthe Electric Flag (1967), a member ofJimi Hendrix'sBand of Gypsys (1969–1970), founder and leader of theBuddy Miles Express and later, the Buddy Miles Band. Miles also played and recorded withCarlos Santana,John McLaughlin, and others. He also sang lead vocals on theCalifornia Raisins claymation TV commercials and recorded two California Raisins R&B albums.
Miles was born inOmaha, Nebraska,[1] on September 5, 1947. Miles's father played upright bass forDuke Ellington,Count Basie,Charlie Parker,Dexter Gordon, and others. By age twelve, Miles had begun touring with his father's band, the Bebops. He played with his father's band for several years.[2]
Given the nickname "Buddy" by his aunt after the drummerBuddy Rich, he was often seen as a teenager hanging out and recording at Universal Promotions Corporation recording studios, which later became Rainbow Recording Studios.[3]
In order to become a professional musician, Miles dropped out of Omaha North High in 1965. The school awarded him an honorary degree in 1998.[4]
Miles played with a variety ofrhythm and blues andsoul acts as a teenager, includingRuby & the Romantics, theDelfonics, andWilson Pickett.[1] In 1964, at the age of 16, Miles met Jimi Hendrix at a show in Montreal, where both were performing as sidemen for other artists.[5]
In 1967, Miles joined Hendrix in a jam session at the Malibu home ofStephen Stills. They also went on to play together again in 1968 in both Los Angeles and New York. In the same year, Miles moved to Chicago where he teamed with guitaristMike Bloomfield and vocalistNick Gravenites to formthe Electric Flag, ablues/soul/rock band.[1] In addition to playing drums, Miles sometimes sang lead vocals for the band, which made its live debut at theMonterey Pop Festival in mid-1967.
In early 1968, the band releasedA Long Time Comin', its first album for Columbia. The Electric Flag's second album,An American Music Band, followed late the same year.[1] Shortly after that release, the group disbanded.[1] In the same year, Hendrix used several guest artists, including Miles, during the recording of his album,Electric Ladyland.[1] Miles played drums on one long jam that was eventually split into two album cuts, "Rainy Day, Dream Away" and "Still Raining, Still Dreaming", with a different song, "1983... (A Merman I Should Turn to Be)", edited in between.[6]
At age 21, after the breakup of the Electric Flag, Miles put together a new band withJim McCarty, who later became the guitarist forCactus. This new group performed and recorded as theBuddy Miles Express.[1] In 1969, Hendrix wrote a short poem as a liner note forExpressway To Your Skull, the first studio album recorded by the Buddy Miles Express. Hendrix went on to produce four of the tracks on the group's follow-up album,Electric Church.[1] The title of the latter LP was taken from Hendrix's poem on the first.
In 1969 he appeared on British jazz guitaristJohn McLaughlin's albumDevotion.
In 1970, after the Buddy Miles Express split up, Miles began a collaboration with Hendrix and bassistBilly Cox. Together, they formedBand of Gypsys, producing oneself-titled live album before disbanding.[1]
Later in 1970, while recording the albumWe Got to Live Together, Miles learned of the death of Hendrix, which he mentioned on the inner cover of the album. Released in 1971,We Got to Live Together was produced by Miles and Robin McBride.
Also in 1971, although the Electric Flag had been inactive for nearly three years, Columbia released a greatest hits album. In 1974, Miles and the Electric Flag re-formed briefly and released another album,The Band Kept Playing, on the Atlantic label.[1]
Miles went on to produce other records as the Buddy Miles Band. One song he had written and recorded with the Band of Gypsys, "Changes", was also recorded by Miles with his own band and released byMercury Records as "Them Changes" soon after Hendrix's death.[1] Miles' former Band of Gypsys sideman, Billy Cox, performed bass guitar on this track. The band also included bassistDavid Hull and guitaristCharlie Karp. The Buddy Miles Band's live album again included "Them Changes," which had become Miles' signature song. The song was released a fourth time on a live record Miles recorded withCarlos Santana.
It was mentioned in the February 10 issue ofBillboard, in both the From The Music Capitals of the World section and Sam Sutherland's Studio Track section that Mike Bloomfield andAl Kooper were to reunite with Miles to record an album for theColumbia label. It was to be released around mid 1973.[7][8]
In 1973, Miles recorded an album withthe Gun'sAdrian Gurvitz calledChapter VII, as well as drummed on a song from Gurvitz's project Three Man Army's albumThird of a Lifetime. TheChapter VII album cover included photos of Miles and his family along with some shots of Carlos Santana, Jimi Hendrix, and Sly Stone. In 1974 Miles releasedAll The Faces Of Buddy Miles on CBS produced byJohnny Bristol, an album aimed at the funk and soul market. It included "Pull Yourself Together," which gave Miles a chart placement on the R&B charts when it was issued as a 7" single. Another track, "I'm Just A Kiss Away", was a huge dance hit amongst followers of the UK "rare groove."[9]
Miles was signed by the record label,Casablanca Records. Miles' work for the label included the album released under his own name,Bicentennial Gathering of the Tribes (1976).[1] The album's liner notes a quote from PresidentJohn F. Kennedy concerning American Indians.[Note 1] In the mid 1970s, Miles recordedRoadrunner co-produced by long time friend Jim Paris. In 1980 Paris and Miles re-united, and together they producedSneak Attack with Miles's new band The Regiment, released by Atlantic Records in 1981.
Miles served a prison term for grand theft in the late 1970s and later another term for auto theft in the early 1980s.[10]
In late 1984 and early 1985 while living in a halfway house in Oakland, California, Miles commuted almost daily toSan Rafael to collaborate with a handful of musicians and songwriters at the Ice House Studios. Collaborators included Producer Jim Gaines, Pat Craig and Dave Carlson from The Tazmanian Devils,David Jenkins fromPablo Cruise, Bill Craig, Tony Saunders (Merl Saunders' son) and Drew Youngs. The project soon moved to theRecord Plant inSausalito, where the group produced over 15 songs, ranging from funky, soulful grooves to R&B ballads. "Anna", the title song of the proposed album, helped Miles land his next recording job with theCalifornia Raisins.[1] However, during the album's production, the Record Plant was seized by the government when its owner was indicted on drug trafficking charges. The musicians and employees working there began calling the studio "Club Fed"; hence the name "The Club Fed Sessions". The album was never released.
In 1986, Miles performed vocals for theCalifornia Raisinsclaymation ad campaign, most notably singing "I Heard It Through the Grapevine", and also performed lead vocals on two California Raisins albums featuring 1960s R&B covers, and a third which featured Christmas tunes.[1] In 1986 and 1987, he rejoined Carlos Santana as a vocalist on Santana's albumFreedom. In 1987–1988, Miles moved to Southern California and with a new band toured the California coast, and theChitlin' Circuit in the U.S. south before disbanding in early 1989.
While residing in Chicago in 1990, Miles, along with guitaristsKevon Smith and Joe Thomas, formed MST. They recordedHell and Back in 1994,[1] and toured the US and Europe until 1997. They were also featured in the DVD,Tribute to Jimi Hendrix – CAS (1997)..
In 1992, Miles worked with bassist Bootsy Collins and guitarist Steve Salas under the supergroup monikerHardware, which released one album calledThird Eye Open.[citation needed]
In 1993, Miles, Billy Cox, andRiki Hendrix appeared on stage to play at a tribute event for Jimi Hendrix.[11]
From 1994 to 2007, Miles formulated his new version of the Buddy Miles Express in the New York City area, with Charlie Torres on bass guitar and vocals, Rod Kohn on guitar and vocals, Mark "Muggie Doo" Leach on Hammond B3, background vocals, and keyboards, and Kenn Moutenot on drums and vocals and handling management. They toured nearly nonstop in the United States and overseas, with nearly 1000 concerts and festivals to their credit.
In 1997, Miles' album,Miles Away from Home was released.[12] Also in 1997, Miles relocated to Fort Worth, Texas. Soon, he began collaborating with a young guitarist from Dallas,Lance Lopez. He went on to mentor Lopez, co-producing Lopez's debut album,First Things First, withJay Newland. The Lopez album was released independently in 1999.
Miles was also seen in the Hendrix-family owned official video release,The Making of Electric Ladyland onRhino Records. The video featured interviews with the majority of players who were involved in recording the album. The video includes footage of Miles playing his drum tracks in the studio against the original multi-track recordings of Hendrix. In 1999, Miles performed on the lateBruce Cameron's album,Midnight Daydream, which included other Hendrix alumni Billy Cox,Mitch Mitchell,Jack Bruce, and others.[citation needed]
In 2000, Miles and Leach collaborated withStevie Ray Vaughan's "Double Trouble" rhythm section, creating the Buddy MilesBlues Berries album which featured Rocky Athas ofBlack Oak Arkansas. This lineup also contributed a cover of Hendrix's "Wind Cries Mary" on theBlue Haze, Songs of Jimi Hendrix album in 2001. In addition, Miles also composed and recorded many songs with this new version of the Buddy Miles Express that are yet to be released. It was Miles' most enduring live band, with the touring lineup continuing for six years with the same members.
The band continued on with Miles and Leach and a host of other players until Miles's passing. The Miles/Leach duo, along with sax man Patrick Gage and bassist Dave Blackerby, also released the Buddy Miles Express' final album,Road to Sturgis, a benefit CD for the Children's Craniofacial Foundation. Miles and Leach continued writing new but unreleased music until just days before Miles' passing.
Also in 2004, Miles reunited yet again with Billy Cox of the Band of Gypsys to re-record songs from the original 1970 live album with guitaristsEric Gales, Kenny Olsen,Sheldon Reynolds, Andy Aledort and Gary Serkin. The album, titledThe Band of Gypsys Return was released in 2006. Until his death, Miles continued to be active musically and performed many shows with proceeds going to help support victims of natural disasters and other charitable causes.
Miles stated that between late September and mid-October 1969, "Jimi was not happy. He felt powerless. He couldn't do what he wanted to do".[13] In mid-October 1969, Hendrix founded a short-lived band calledBand of Gypsys, which Miles would join.Alan Douglas and Stephan Bright were initially brought in to produce their recording sessions, but bassist Billy Cox clashed with the pair, deeming them unworthy. Cox stormed out of the sessions after a furious row with Bright and went home to Nashville for two weeks, before being coaxed back. At the end of Douglas and Bright's one-and-a-half months together, they had only produced one usable backing track, "Room Full of Mirrors". Douglas and Bright resigned, stating pressures from the record label, Hendrix's manager Michael Jeffery, and Hendrix's own "lack of interest".
The same day Douglas resigned, Hendrix signed the contract with Bill Graham for two dates at theFillmore East. Hendrix had been talking about a Band of Gypsys "jam" LP since late 1968, after the settlement withEd Chalpin. The recording of the Fillmore East concert was initially a single LP, but additional cuts from the concerts have been released on a double CD,Live at the Fillmore East. During the2+1⁄2 months before the two nights' worth of recordings for the LP, the band rehearsed and recorded in New York City.[Note 2] Hendrix was required to give his next LP to Chalpin to be released by theCapitol Records label, but he had become entangled in litigation concerning the contract with Chalpin'sPPX record company that he had signed, his agreement with Jeffery & Chandler prior to the contract, and becoming internationally recognized. This fact led to Miles and Billy Cox being hired as full-time employees for the duration of the three-month collaboration called the 'Band of Gypsys'. In the end, the band produced the LP for Chalpin and Capitol, as well as a single for Reprise.
During a one-off charity event for theMoratorium to End the War in Vietnam committee a month later, Hendrix had a minor meltdown on stage. Speculations include a possibly drug-related meltdown on stage, as well as an act of sabotage on the part of Jeffery. Miles said about the incident years later, "Jeffery slipped [Hendrix] two half-tabs of acid on stage as he went on... [Hendrix] just freaked out. I told Jeffery he was an out-and-out complete idiot... One of the biggest reasons why Jimi is dead is because of that guy."[13] Miles and Jeffery already had a strained relationship, as Jeffery was uncomfortable with Hendrix's and Miles' close friendship. After this one-off charity event at Madison Square Garden in January 1970, Jeffery told Miles that he was fired and the Band of Gypsys was no more. Although Cox, and presumably Miles as well, had already been paid off as full-time salaried employees with a $1,000 bonus for their services the week before.
While with Hendrix, Miles recorded a number of jams, demos, and songs. Over the years, more material recorded at the Fillmore East on New Years 1969–1970 has been issued. In 2019, the complete performances from all four shows were released on the box setSongs for Groovy Children: The Fillmore East Concerts.[14] The original versions of "Stepping Stone" and "Izabella", songs which he recorded for the 1970 single with Cox and Hendrix, were restored and included on the 2001 compilationVoodoo Child: The Jimi Hendrix Collection.[15] Three other songs that were recorded with Cox and Hendrix were used for early posthumous Hendrix albums, includingThe Cry of Love andRainbow Bridge.[16] Additional studio recordings by the trio in various stages of development were released onSouth Saturn Delta,The Jimi Hendrix Experience box set,Burning Desire,West Coast Seattle Boy: The Jimi Hendrix Anthology, andPeople, Hell and Angels.
At the age of 60, Buddy Miles died on February 26, 2008, at his home in Austin, Texas, with his family by his side. According to his website, he died of congestive heart disease. Miles was cremated, and there was no funeral.[citation needed]
The day before Miles died, he heard Steve Winwood and Eric Claptonplaying "Them Changes" at Madison Square Garden through his cell phone. "Them Changes" is now part of Clapton's set on tour as a tribute to Miles. The UK-based newspaperThe Independent ran an almost full-page obituary in its Friday, February 29, 2008, edition.[17]
Asked how he would like to be remembered by the American music magazineSeconds in 1995, Miles simply said: "The baddest of the bad. People say I'm the baddest drummer. If that's true, thank you world."[18] A memorial concert took place on March 30, 2008, atThreadgill's on Riverside Drive, South Austin that included performances byBernie Worrell, The Family Stone Project, Doug Pinnick, Cyril Neville, The Sixth Chamber and surviving members of the Buddy Miles Express.
On June 23, 2019, Buddy Miles was inducted into the National Rhythm and Blues Hall of Fame in Detroit, Michigan as a part of theBand of Gypsys, along with Jimi Hendrix and Billy Cox.[19]
On October 6, 2024, Buddy Miles was inducted into the National Rhythm and Blues Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio as a solo artist.[20]
| Year | Album | US[21] | USR&B[22] | CA[23] | GE[24] | NDL[25] | UK[26] | Certification | Label |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1968 | Expressway to Your Skull(as Buddy Miles Express) | — | — | — | — | — | — | Mercury | |
| 1969 | Electric Church (as Buddy Miles Express) | 145 | — | — | — | — | — | ||
| 1970 | Them Changes | 35 | 14 | 27 | — | — | — | ||
| 1970 | We Got to Live Together | 53 | 14 | 46 | — | — | — | ||
| 1971 | A Message to the People | 60 | 12 | 73 | — | — | — | ||
| 1971 | Buddy Miles "Live" | 50 | 10 | 37 | — | — | — | ||
| 1972 | Carlos Santana & Buddy Miles! Live! | 8 | 6 | 15 | 14 | 6 | 29 |
| Columbia |
| 1973 | Chapter VII | 123 | 36 | — | — | — | — | ||
| 1973 | Booger Bear (as Buddy Miles Express) | 194 | 47 | — | — | — | — | ||
| 1974 | All the Faces of Buddy Miles | — | — | — | — | — | — | ||
| 1975 | More Miles Per Gallon | 68 | 27 | — | — | — | — | Casablanca | |
| 1976 | Bicentennial Gathering of the Tribes | — | — | — | — | — | — | ||
| 1977 | Roadrunner | — | — | — | — | — | — | T-Town | |
| 1981 | Sneak Attack | — | — | — | — | — | — | Atlantic | |
| 1987 | Sing the Hit Songs (withThe California Raisins) | — | — | — | — | — | — | Priority | |
| 1988 | Sweet, Delicious, & Marvelous (withThe California Raisins) | 140 | — | — | — | — | — | Priority | |
| 1988 | Meet the Raisins! (withThe California Raisins) | — | — | — | — | — | — | Atlantic | |
| 1988 | Christmas with the California Raisins (withThe California Raisins) | — | — | — | — | — | — | Priority | |
| 1994 | Hell and Back (as Buddy Miles Express) | — | — | — | — | — | — | Rykodisc | |
| 1997 | Tribute to Jimi Hendrix | — | — | — | — | — | — | Pavement | |
| 1997 | The Best of Buddy Miles (compilation) | — | — | — | — | — | — | Mercury/Polygram | |
| 1998 | Miles Away from Home | — | — | — | — | — | — | Hip-O | |
| 2002 | Blues Berries (withRocky Athas) | — | — | — | — | — | — | Ruf | |
| 2004 | Changes | — | — | — | — | — | — | SPV | |
| 2006 | The Band of Gypsys Return (withBilly Cox) | — | — | — | — | — | — | Image Entertainment |
| International | |
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| National | |
| Academics | |
| Artists | |
| People | |
| Other | |
