Virtually an institution after a decade on the scene, Boston's finest ska band continues to deliver an extreme adrenaline rush on its fifth album, which was produced by Paul Kolderie and Sean Slade. The metal edge in the Bosstone's particular brand of skacore comes further to the forefront this time, while songs such as "Noise Brigade" and "Royal Oil" rank among the catchiest they've recorded. And Nate Albert continues to carve out a new role for the guitar in ska-influenced music. Jim Derogatis

In 1955, Miles Davis signed on with jazz powerhouse Columbia Records. With alto and tenor saxophonists Cannonball Adderley and John Coltrane, drummer Philly Joe Jones, bassist Paul Chambers, and pianist Red Garland, Davis released 'Round About Midnight, which evinces even more clearly what a phenomenal unit Davis was nurturing. Stylistically, Midnight encompasses standards (or soon-to-be standards) such as "Dear Old Stockholm," "Bye-Bye Blackbird," Tadd Dameron's "Tadd's Delight," and Jackie McLean's forward-thinking composition "Little Melonae." Miles and company reprise "Budo" from the historic Birth of the Cool sessions. The standout track is Davis's Harmon-muted reading of Thelonious Monk's ballad, "'Round Midnight, which is still a Miles standard bearer. Three alternate takes round out the session: "Two Bass Hit" and "Sweet Sue" feature adventuresome solos by Coltrane that preview his masterpiece "Giant Steps." And Garland moves away from his Ahmad Jamal pianisms with his introspective ivory ticklings. If you want to hear the origins of post-bop modern jazz, this is it. —Eugene Holley Jr.

Japanese version featuring a limited LP style slipcase cover. DSD digitally remastered.

The first important leader date from one of jazz's most seminal figures and farsighted practitioners. Having made his reputation in large measure from playing with bop giant Charlie Parker, Davis confounded expectations when he embraced the "cool" arranging style of Gil Evans, an arranger for Claude Thornhill's band. Evans, who was employing unique voicings by adding French horns and tuba to Thornhill's instrumentations, also emphasized a diminished use of vibrato in both reeds and brass, producing a drier, "cool" sound. Two of Evans's arrangements, "Boplicity" and "Moon Dreams," appear on the album. Also involved are baritone saxophonist Gerry Mulligan, who contributed such outstanding tunes as "Jeru" and "Venus de Milo," and Modern Jazz Quartet pianist John Lewis. The result is a date that has withstood the tests of time, fashion, and Davis's own extraordinary growth as a performer.

An enhanced set, The Complete Birth of the Cool features previously bootlegged live recordings of the nonet at the Royal Roost in New York in 1948. Although the sound quality is far from perfect, the performances are remarkable, and worth the additional expense for the serious fan. —Fred Goodman

Miles Davis's second great quintet had been together a little over a year when this recording was made in December 1965 in Chicago (it represents a good chunk of the strongest moments drawn from the eight-CD Complete Live at the Plugged Nickel). Everyone in the band was a star, and close listening to any one of them apart from the others is revealing. Bassist Ron Carter erects the scaffolding, while Herbie Hancock's piano adds filigree and lace, and drummer Tony Williams thunders and sparks. Miles is sublime, but it is Wayne Shorter who is busy making his place in jazz history here, secure with the unending freshness and volatility of his ideas and the beauty of his sound. The band hangs together miraculously, always balancing their risks with nuance and the subtlest of dynamics. An irresistible record, and essential for hearing one of the great musical organizations at work. —John Szwed

Miles Davis's famous mid-1960s quintet, featuring saxophonist Wayne Shorter and pianist Herbie Hancock, was intact until just a few weeks before his new, electric ensemble recorded In a Silent Way. Legendary as a kind of line in the sand challenging jazz fans during the ascendance of electric, psychedelic rock, In a Silent Way hinted at the repetitive polyrhythms Davis would employ throughout the early 1970s. It also partook generously of electric piano and bass and rekindled the tonal palette that Davis had explored famously with Kind of Blue. But In a Silent Way remains a clearly electric jazz record, part ambient color exploration, part rock-inflected energy and vibe, and part outright maverick creativity. Davis takes many long, breathy solos, and they glisten in a burnished blue against his new group's strange admixture of musical moods. —Andrew Bartlett

Miles Davis's Kind of Blue is nothing if not legendary, and this live date—never before released on CD—captures most of the classic Kind of Blue band in concert. Recorded at the Plaza Hotel in Manhattan in 1958 and originally released in 1973, this live set superbly spotlights Davis's "walking on eggshells" melodicism. Pianist Bill Evans, alto and tenor saxophonists Cannonball Adderley and John Coltrane, drummer Jimmy Cobb, bassist Paul Chambers, and Davis blow the blues on Sonny Rollins's "Oleo" and Thelonious Monk's "Straight No Chaser." Davis's warm, Harmon-muted trumpet melodically shoots Cupid's arrow on "If I Were a Bell" and "My Funny Valentine," with Evans's piano lines sounding equally footed in Ravel and modal bop. Add the Bird flights of Adderley and the spooling energy of Coltrane and you have one of the top groups at the top of their game. This is a marvel, a hot and cool preview to the band's landmark 1959 Kind of Blue explorations. —Eugene Holley Jr.

Japanese DSD mastered reissue of 1962 release for the late jazz icon. Packaged in a miniature LP sleeve for the first pressing only. 2001 release.

The most satisfying sort of audacity was the rule with Miles Davis's second great quintet. One of six studio albums cut by the group between 1965 and 1968, Miles Smiles finds them executing three Wayne Shorter compositions and one by the leader, along with Eddie Harris's "Freedom Jazz Dance," former Davis cohort Jimmy Cobb's "Gingerbread Boy," and the usual mix of finesse and barreling momentum. Even when nodding toward the then-burgeoning hard-bop movement on the Harris piece, the group makes its own mark in a hundred different ways, from Herbie Hancock's spare touch to the thoroughly declarative solo Davis lays down. It's hard to pick the most exceptional cut on such a top-flight disc, but certainly Shorter's deceptively simple "Orbits" and "Footprints" deserve mention; on the former, the players take turns stating the melody and then rumbling over it. The latter's echoes of "Caravan" make way for an improv performance that not only hangs tough in itself, but seems to have provided a template for the entire early career of Wynton Marsalis. —Rickey Wright

Limited Edition Japanese pressing of this album comes housed in a miniature LP sleeve. Sony. 2006.

The fourth studio album by the second great Miles Davis quintet, and the second comprising material recorded in the pivotal year of 1967, NEFERTITI marked yet another metamorphosis in the career of a great musician noted for welcoming change. While Davis (1926-1991) did not make wholesale, far- reaching alterations on NEFERTITI, as he had on KIND OF BLUE and E.S.P and would on BITCHES BREW, one could say that the pace-setting trumpeter-bandleader modified his approach to the freebop that had for two-and-and-half years been his group's bread and butter, at least for recording purposes.

On the title selection, and to a lesser extent on "Fall" (another indelibly aching piece) and "Pinocchio," all high water marks in the catalogue of tenor saxophonist Wayne Shorter, the group's principal composer, Davis had the front line and rhythm section reverse their traditional roles. While the horns repeated the theme again and again, pianist Herbie Hancock, bassist Ron Carter, and drummer Tony Williams shifted the beat's emphasis, stretched the time, and offered a full dynamic/emotional range. The effect was like a series of time lapse photographs of a particularly beautiful scene, with light and color and shadows subtly, but continually changing, thus shifting the focus of one's eye - or, in this case, ear. This made for some of Davis' most mesmerizing music since KIND OF BLUE and SKETCHES OF SPAIN.

Expanded significantly to almost 66 minutes by the the inclusion of four consistently enthralling alternate takes, NEFERTITI presents Miles Davis' second great quintet at the peak of their hypnotic, roiling, poetic powers.