It’s 1984, and Miles Davis is changing his musical course yet again. He’d exhausted his exploration of jazz fusion and now looked for a fresh perspective. The result was “You’re Under Arrest.” This album was intentionally controversial – from its garish cover art, to its confounding mix of in-your-face statements and sugary pop ballads. It was also Miles’s most overtly political record to date.
Miles Davis chose this time to go public with his long-held views on nuclear proliferation, racism, and especially, police intimidation. He had fallen victim to police brutality in 1959, when he was beaten and arrested by a white New York City cop. As he released “You’re Under Arrest,” Miles also lent his horn to the Sun City anti-apartheid movement, and to Amnesty International.
He had always been a supporter of the equality struggle and a vocal defender of Black culture. He believed that jazz was the purview of Black America, and that white musicians had co-opted their way into the art form. He was a staunch defender of the disenfranchised and openly contemptuous of the aura of white privilege. At a White House gathering, Nancy Reagan is said to have asked Davis, “What have you done to deserve being here?” Miles replied, “Well, I’ve changed the course of music five or six times. What have you done?”
“You’re under Arrest,” Miles’s latest course change, was initially met with a mixed, confused response. But, like the musician himself, the music and the causes he championed are multi-layered, difficult to define, and require study and contemplation.
This episode of “Soundtrack to the Struggle” was written and produced by Ron Adkins.
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