Jeremy Simon on Miles

Miles came to my bachelor party in Big Bear, CA. He rolled up late at night with a bag of meat, made everyone burgers, and got in an argument with my friend in the hot tub. He later explained that my friend was being bourgeois and deserved it. Fair enough.

Miles was there when I bought my house in Highland Park. He called it my “weird little normal adobe house”. He lectured me on buying into the neighbourhood, not just the property. He improved me like that.

Miles invited me to orchestrate strings for Phases In Exile, in return for bass parts for my stuff. “Strings for strings” he called it. We sat in my Echo Park apartment listening to Wagner and Vaughan Williams and Nick Drake, and making dirty jokes. It was the privilege of my life collaborating on that album. I know how personal it was for him.

Miles and I met in 2011 at a music festival in way-out-there Quebec mining town Rouyn-Noranda. I interviewed him. We talked about free jazz and Los Angeles and his new crush Leanne. At the Akron gig that night he ran over and rhythmed my leg like a cowbell.

Miles played processional music at my wedding. I asked if he could make a guitar sound like an organ (he could). The marriage didn’t last, but friends still talk about how great that music was.

Miles lent me three records once - Albert Ayler, The Last Poets, Megafaun. What a trip.

We lost touch when he moved to Italy. But I always hoped I could have visited him there.

Miles, peace. Gone, but your light shines on. You’re with the cosmos now. Have fun out there.