Sony Music is set to reissue Miles Davis‘s 1970 album Bitches Brew in ‘Legacy’ and ‘Deluxe’ editions on August 30.

These new editions mark the 40th anniversary of the original album’s release. One of the most iconic albums by a man who made a habit of making iconic albums, Bitches Brew is the high watermark of Miles’ late, electric period, perhaps second only to his riveting score for A Tribute To Jack Johnson. As evinced by Mati Klarwein’s cover art, the album is certainly one of the trumpeter’s most concertedly psychedelic works, drawing timely inspiration from the cosmic funk and rock of Jimi Hendrix, Santana, James Brown and Sly Stone. Artists such as Brian Eno, Can, Portishead, Radiohead, Flying Lotus and The Flaming Lips have in turn cited Bitches Brew as a major influence on their own work.

The original double-LP was comprised of six tracks produced by Teo Macero, who pioneered the idea of “studio as instrument” in a jazz context: a vast array of tape loops, delays and reverb effects were employed during recording and post-production, and opening track ‘Pharaoh’s Dance’ contains no less than 19 edits, quite remarkable for the time. Four Miles originals – ‘Bitches Brew’, ‘Spanish Key’, ‘John McLaughlin’ and the aptly named ‘Miles Runs The Voodoo Down’ – are book-ended by compositions from Joe Zawinul (‘Pharaoh’s Dance’) and Wayne Shorter (‘Sanctuary’).

The album was recorded at Columbia’s Studio B in New York City, and features a large number of notable sidemen: not just Zawinul and Shorter, but also Jack DeJohnette, Bill Cobham, Dave Holland, Bennie Maupin, Larry Young, Chick Corea, Lenny White, Harvey Brooks and many more.

Sony’s new Deluxe & Legacy Editions contain the original 95 minutes of music in their 8-track studio versions, a DVD of a previously unavailable live performance by the Miles Davis Quintet (Davis, Corea, Holland, Shorter and DeJohnette) in Copenhagen, November 1969, plus six bonus tracks including the extremely rare Columbia jukebox 45 edit of ‘Miles Runs The Voodoo Down’/’Spanish Theme’. The Deluxe Collectros’ Edition also includes a 5,000 word booklet by Greg Tate, a 180g vinyl pressing, memorabilia enelope and a third CD featuring a previously unreleased concert from Davis’s septet line-up recorded in Tanglewood, USA in August 1970.

More information here.