Jimi Hendrix
Jimi Hendrix |
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James Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix (27 November, 1942 – 18 September, 1970) was an American musician, singer, songwriter, guitarist, and cultural icon. Widely lauded by music fans and critics alike, Hendrix is arguably the greatest and most influential electric guitarist in rock music history.
Mostly self-taught on the instrument, the left-handed Hendrix used a regular (right-handed) guitar which he turned upside down and re-strung to suit him. As a guitarist, he built upon the innovations of blues stylists such as B.B. King, Albert King, Buddy Guy, T-Bone Walker, and Muddy Waters, as well as those of rhythm and blues and soul guitarists like Curtis Mayfield. Hendrix's music was also influenced by jazz; he often cited Rahsaan Roland Kirk as his favorite musician. Most importantly, Hendrix extended the tradition of rock guitar: although previous guitarists, such as The Kinks' Dave Davies, Jeff Beck, and The Who's Pete Townshend, had employed techniques such as feedback, distortion and other effects as sonic tools, Hendrix was able to exploit them to a previously undreamed-of extent, and made them an integral part of his compositions.
As a record producer, Hendrix was an innovator in using the recording studio as an extension of his musical ideas. Hendrix was notably one of the first to experiment with stereo effects during the recording process. Hendrix was also an accomplished songwriter whose compositions have been performed by countless artists.
Names
Hendrix was born Johnny Allen Hendrix in Seattle, Washington, the son of Al Hendrix and Lucille Jeter Hendrix. As a toddler and young boy he was known as 'Buster', a family nickname. At age three, his father, after returning from military service in World War II, legally renamed him James Marshall Hendrix. As a school age boy and young adult, he was simply known as 'Jimmy' or 'James'. In his early career, he would sometimes use the stage name 'Jimmy James'. He did not use the moniker 'Jimi' until after his discovery in late 1966, although most writings refer to him as 'Jimi' throughout the timeline of his life for purposes of consistency.
Family origins
Jimi Hendrix was of mixed African American, European, and Cherokee Native American descent.
Both of Jimi's paternal grandparents were vaudeville performers from the midwest who settled in Vancouver, British Columbia, where Al Hendrix was born. Jimi was close to his paternal grandmother Nora Rose Moore, the daughter of a Cherokee father and a mulatto mother, who instilled in him a strong sense of pride about his Native American ancestry, which would later become a recurring theme in his music. Jimi's paternal grandfather was the mulatto son of a former slave and the white merchant who once owned her. Al Hendrix (1920-2002) was the youngest of their four children.
Jimi's maternal grandfather, Preston Jeter, was also the mulatto son of a former slave and slave owner. He left Richmond, Virginia at the turn of the century after witnessing a lynching, and settled in the Seattle area. In 1915, he married Clarice Lawson, a woman half his age who was of mixed Cherokee and slave descent. Lucille Jeter was the youngest of their eight children.
Lucille met Al through a mutual friend and they began dating. The same week that Lucille realized she was pregnant with Jimi, Al received his draft notice and shipped off to the U.S. Army three days after they were married. It would be three years before Al would see his son for the first time. Lucille endured both personal and financial hardships while her husband was away: her father Preston passed away months after Jimi was born; nearly two years passed before any of Al's military pay reached her; and a fire destroyed the Jeters' uninsured home. When Al returned from his military service, Jimi was living with a church friend of the Jeter family in Berkeley, California. His caregiver offered to keep the boy, but after some internal debate, Al brought his son back to Seattle. He changed Jimi's name from Johnny Allen to James Marshall because he felt the name Johnny referred to John Page, a man whom Lucille became involved with during Al's military service. Still, Al decided to stay married to Lucille.
Over the next few years, four more children were born into the Hendrix family: Leon in January 1948; Joseph, born with serious birth defects; Kathy, born sixteen weeks premature and blind; and Pamela, also born with health problems. All four of Jimi's siblings were eventually moved into foster homes. Lucille and Al gave up their parental rights to Kathy, Pamela, and then Joseph. Jimi and Leon would sometimes spend time with Pamela in their neighborhood or run into Joe on the streets of the Central District. In December 1951, Lucille left Al and they divorced, with Al retaining custody of the two boys. Three years later, social workers placed Leon into a foster home due to parental neglect. Young Jimi remained with Al only because he was already a teenager and required less care. Fortunately, Leon was placed only a few blocks away in a large home that young Jimi frequently visited, so the two brothers continued to grow up together.
In late 1957, Lucille's excessive drinking and partying began to take it's toll on her health. She was hospitalized twice for cirrosis of the liver. In January 1958, she married retired longshoreman William Mitchell after a very brief courtship - he was 30 years older than she. Weeks later she was hospitalized again, this time with hepatitis. Jimi and Leon visited her at the hospital and were shocked at her sickly appearance. This would be the last time they would see their mother. On February 1, 1958, Lucille was found unconscious in the back alley of a bar on Yesler Street. She went nearly untreated at the hospital while staff attended to other patients and died of a ruptured spleen, more commonly associated with physical trauma than with liver problems. Her death was never investigated.
In late 1966, Al Hendrix married Ayako June Fujita and adopted her daughter from a previous marriage, Janie, who assumed the name Janie Hendrix.
Early life
Youth
Jimi grew up shy, sensitive, and full of confusion. Like his contemporaries John Lennon and Paul McCartney, Hendrix was deeply affected by family events: his parents' divorce when he was nine; and the death of his mother in 1958. Hendrix was fond of listening to Elvis Presley (a color drawing, showing a young Elvis armed with a guitar, and made by the then impressionable 15-year-old Hendrix, two months after attending Presley's concert at Seattle's Sick's Stadium on September 1, 1957, can be seen at that city's Rock museum).
At about age fourteen, Jimi acquired his very first guitar, a severely battered acoustic with one string that he retrieved when another boy had thrown it away. That same year his only failing grade in school was an F in music class. His first electric guitar was a white Supro Ozark that his father, Al Hendrix, had purchased for him. He learned simply by practicing and watching others play, and he idolized the flashy moves of T-Bone Walker and the duck walk of Chuck Berry.
His first gig was with an unnamed band in the basement of a synagogue. After too much wild playing and showing off, he was fired in between sets. The first formal band he played with was the Velvetones, who played regularly at the the Yesler Terrace Neighborhood House without pay. His flashy style and left-handed playing of a right-handed guitar was already a standout. At some point, his guitar was stolen when he left it backstage overnight. Al then bought him a white Silvertone Danelectro which he painted red and emblazoned with the words Betty Jean, the name of his high school girlfriend.
Hendrix graduated junior high school with little trouble but failed to graduate from Garfield High School. When his fame began in the late 1960's, Hendrix would punch up his own past by telling reporters that he was expelled by racist faculty for holding hands with a white girlfriend in study hall, but Principal Frank Hanawalt insisted that it was simply due to poor grades and attendance problems.
Military service
After getting into trouble with the law via a stolen car, Hendrix traded a two year jail sentence for enlistment in the U.S. Army. After boot camp in Fort Ord, California, he was assigned to the 101st Airborne Division and stationed in Fort Campbell, Kentucky as a trainee paratrooper. Other paratrooper divisions would later mistakenly claim that he was part of their regiment.
His letters home indicate that initially at least, he was adjusting to Army life and was very excited to be a part of the 101st Airborne, a well respected outfit after their heroic actions in World War II. His military records however, show that Hendrix was considered an incompetent soldier, repeatedly caught sleeping while on duty and missing at midnight bed-check. Superiors noted that he needed constant supervision even for basic tasks, and lacked motivation. He was described by one supervisor as having "no known good characteristics", and by another that "his mind apparently cannot function while performing duties and thinking about his guitar"[1].
At the post recreation center, he met fellow soldier and bass player Billy Cox, and forged a loyal friendship that would serve Hendrix well during the last year of his life. The two would play with other musicians at venues both on and off the post.
After less than a year of service, Hendrix was recommended for discharge for "behavior problems", "little regard for regulations", and for being "apprehended masturbating in platoon area while supposed to be on detail"[2]. Hendrix would later tell reporters that he received a medical discharge after breaking his ankle during his 26th parachute jump. The 2005 biography Room Full Of Mirrors by Charles Cross claims that Hendrix faked being gay--claiming to have fallen in love with a fellow soldier--and was therefore discharged. According to Cross, Hendrix was an avid anti-communist and did not leave the Army as a protest to the Vietnam War, but simply wanted out so he could focus on playing guitar.
As a celebrity, Hendrix spoke nonchalantly of his military service, but once said that the sound of air whistling through the parachute shrouds was one of the sources of his "spacy" guitar sound. Although discharged from the Army three years before Vietnam saw large numbers of U.S. soldiers arrive, his recordings would become favorites of soldiers fighting there, most notably "All Along the Watchtower", a Bob Dylan cover.
Early career
The Chitlin Circuit
After leaving Ft. Campbell, Hendrix and his friend and bandmate Billy Cox moved to nearby Nashville. There they played, and sometimes lived, in the clubs along Jefferson Street, the traditional heart of Nashville's black community, and home to a lively rhythm and blues scene[3].
During the early 1960s, Hendrix made a precarious living on the Chitlin Circuit, performing in backing bands for touring soul and blues musicians, including Curtis Knight, B. B. King, and Little Richard. His first notice came from appearances with The Isley Brothers, notably on the two-parter "Testify" in 1964.
On October 15, 1965, Hendrix signed a 3-year recording contract with entrepreneur Ed Chalpin, receiving $1 and 1% royalty on records with Curtis Knight. The relationship with Chalpin was short-lived, and Hendrix moved on to other opportunities. However, from a legal point of view, his contract remained in force, which caused considerable problems for Hendrix later on in his career. The result was a legal dispute which was eventually settled (see below).
Greenwich Village
Frustrated by his experiences in the South, Hendrix decided to try his luck in New York City, where he lived in Harlem with girlfriend Lithofayne "Faye" Pridgeon and the Allen twins, Albert and Arthur. Early on, he won $25 in an Apollo Theater amateur contest, but in general, black audiences in Harlem weren't receptive to his progressive style of music. Hendrix had a much better reception with the eclectic mix of patrons in the clubs of Greenwich Village.
In 1966 he formed a band named Jimmy James and The Blue Flames, comprised of various friends he would casually meet at Manny's Music Shop, including a 15-year old runaway from California named Randy Wolfe. Since there were two musicians named "Randy" in the group, Hendrix dubbed Wolfe "Randy California" and the other "Randy Texas". Randy California would would later co-found the band Spirit with Ed Cassidy.
Hendrix and his band quickly gained local fame and would play throughout New York City, but their primary spot was a residency at the Cafe Wha? on MacDougal Street in the East Village. During this period Hendrix met and worked with singer-guitarist Ellen McIlwaine and guitarist Jeff "Skunk" Baxter, who was an employee at Manny's. Hendrix also met iconoclast Frank Zappa during this time. Zappa introduced Hendrix to the newly-invented wah-wah pedal, a tool which Hendrix soon mastered and made an integral part of his sound.
Discovery
It was at the Cafe Wha? where Linda Keith, then-girlfriend of The Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards, befriended Hendrix and couldn't believe that he hadn't been discovered. She recommended Hendrix to Stones manager Andrew Loog Oldham and then to producer Seymour Stein, but both men did not take a liking to Hendrix's music and passed. She even brought the members of the Rolling Stones to a Blue Flames show, but the effort did not yield any results. She then referred Chas Chandler, who was ending his tenure as bassist of The Animals and looking for talent to produce. Chandler was enamoured with the folk song Hey Joe and was convinced that he could create a hit single by remaking it as a rock song. It was again at the Cafe Wha? where the discovery took place. When Hendrix launched into his own rendition of Hey Joe, Chandler became so excited that he spilled a drink on himself.
Chandler brought Hendrix to London, signed him to a management and production contract with himself and Animals manager Michael Jeffery, and helped him form a new band, The Jimi Hendrix Experience, with guitarist-turned-bassist Noel Redding and drummer Mitch Mitchell.
The Jimi Hendrix Experience
UK success
After a number of blockbuster European club appearances, word of the new star spread through the British music industry. His showmanship and dazzling virtuosity made instant fans of reigning guitar heroes Eric Clapton and Jeff Beck, as well as members of The Beatles and The Who, whose managers signed Hendrix to The Who's record label, Track Records.
Jimi's first single was a cover of "Hey Joe", crafted after folk-singer Tim Rose's slower revision of the song and adapted to Hendrix's emerging style. Backing the first single was Jimi's first songwriting effort, "Stone Free". Further success came with the incendiary and original "Purple Haze", with a heavily distorted guitar sound, and the soulful ballad "The Wind Cries Mary". The three singles were all U.K. Top 10 hits. Onstage, Hendrix was also making a huge impression with fiery renditions of the BB King hit "Rock Me Baby" and an ultra-fast revision of Howlin Wolf's blues classic, "Killing Floor".
Established as a star in the U.K., Hendrix and his girlfriend Kathy Etchingham moved into a flat at 23 Brook Street in central London. The nearby 25 Brook Street was once the home of baroque composer George Frideric Handel. Hendrix, aware of this musical coincidence, bought Handel recordings including Messiah and the Water Music. The two houses currently comprise the Handel House Museum, where both musicians are celebrated.
Are You Experienced
In 1967, the Jimi Hendrix Experience released its first album, Are You Experienced. The singles that the band had previously released, i.e. Hey Joe, Purple Haze, and the Wind Cries Mary, were included in the album as well as a number of other original recordings. The album is a template for much of their later work in that it represents a mix of melodic ballads ("The Wind Cries Mary"), pop-rock ("Fire"), and psychedelia ("Third Stone from the Sun"), and blues ("Red House").
Around that time, the band were also touring the United Kingdom and parts of Europe extensively. This allowed Hendrix to develop his stage presence, which sometimes involved pyrotechnics. Later, after causing damage to amplifiers and other stage equipment at his shows, Rank Theatre management warned him to "tone down" his stage act.
U.S. success
Later on in 1967, the Jimi Hendrix Experience received their first opportunity to break into the American scene. Earlier that year, Paul McCartney had accepted to promote the Monterey Pop Festival, but this was on the condition that the Experience be included in festival. This proved to be a great opportunity for Hendrix, not only because of the large audience that was present at the event, but also because most of the performances were filmed and were later shown in movie theatres throughout the country. D. A. Pennebaker was responsible for filming the event, and immortalized Hendrix's iconic burning and smashing of his guitar in the film Monterey Pop.
A short gig, opening for the pop group The Monkees on their first American tour, followed the festival. The Monkees asked for Hendrix because they were fans, but their mostly teenage audience did not warm to his outlandish stage act and he abruptly quit the tour after a few dates, just as "Purple Haze" gained popularity in America. Chas Chandler later admitted that being "thrown" from The Monkees tour was engineered to gain maximum media impact and outrage for Hendrix. At the time a story circulated claiming that Hendrix was removed from the tour because of complaints made by the Daughters of the American Revolution that his stage conduct was "lewd and indecent". Australian journalist Lillian Roxon, accompanying the tour with singer Lynne Randell (the other support act), concocted the story. The claim was repeated in Roxon's 1969 Rock Encyclopedia but she later admitted it was fabricated.
Meanwhile in England, Hendrix's wild-man image and musical gimmickry (such as playing the guitar with his teeth and behind his back) continued to bring publicity, but Hendrix was already advancing musically and becoming frustrated by media and audience concentration on his stage act and his hit singles.
Axis: Bold as Love
The Jimi Hendrix Experience's second 1967 album, Axis: Bold as Love continued the style established by Are You Experienced with tracks such as "Little Wing" and "If 6 Was 9", showing his continuing mastery of the electric guitar. A mishap almost prevented the album's release; Hendrix lost the master tape of side 1 of the LP after he left it in a taxi. With the release deadline looming, Hendrix, Chandler and engineer Eddie Kramer in an all-night session made a remix from the multitracks. Kramer and Hendrix later said that they were never entirely happy with the results.
The Jimi Hendrix Experience continued to pursue an extremely demanding touring schedule, which involved performing in front of ever-larger audiences. This, combined with the influence of drugs, alcohol and fatigue, led to a trouble-plagued tour of Scandinavia, which eventually culminated with his arrest in Stockholm, after trashing a hotel room in a drunken rage.
Electric Ladyland
The band's third recording, a double album, Electric Ladyland (1968), was a departure from their previous efforts and is considered by many fans to be the best of the three studio releases.
As the album's recording progressed, Chas Chandler became so frustrated with Hendrix's perfectionism and with various friends and hangers-on milling about the studio that he decided to sever his professional relationship with Hendrix. Chandler's professional and musical education was very business-oriented, and it taught him that songs should be recorded in a matter of hours, and should be written with a view to releasing them as singles. His influence over the Experience's first two albums is clear in light of the facts that very few of the tracks are more than four minutes long, that both albums were recorded in short times, and that most of the songs on both albums conformed to the structure of a typical pop song. However, as Hendrix began developing his own vision and started to assert more control over the artistic process in the studio, Chandler decided to move to other opportunities and ceded overall control to Hendrix. Chandler's departure had a clear impact on the artistic direction that the recording took.
During the recording of Electric Ladyland, Hendrix agreed to finance the construction and operation of his own state-of-the-art multitrack studio in New York City, Electric Lady Studios. The result was that Hendrix now had unlimited access to studio time and could experiment in a number of different ways. including different combinations of musicians and instruments, and modern electronic effects. For example, Dave Mason, Chris Wood and Steve Winwood from the band Traffic, drummer Buddy Miles and former Dylan organist Al Kooper, among others, were all involved in the recording sessions. This was one of the other reasons that Chandler cited as precipitating his departure. He described how Hendrix went from a disciplined recording regimen to an erratic schedule, which often saw him beginning recording sessions in the middle of the night and with any number of hangers-on.
Chandler also expressed exasperation at the number of times Hendrix would insist on re-recording particular tracks ("Gypsy Eyes", one of the tracks on Electric Lady Land, was reportedly recorded 43 times). This was also frustrating for bassist Noel Redding, who would often leave the studio to calm himself, only to return and find that Hendrix had recorded the bass parts himself during Redding's absence.
The effects of these events can clearly be identified in the album's musical style. On a purely superficial level, the tracks no longer conformed to the standard pop song format, often lacked easily identifiable patterns or sections, and would sometimes lack even a recognizable melody. More particularly, however, the themes that the songs addressed, and the music that Hendrix set out to record, went far beyond anything that he had attempted to achieve before.
By way of example, four of the album's tracks actually form part of a single musical arrangement, which is introduced towards the beginning as taking place during a dream ("Rainy Day, Dream Away"). Then, during the dream, the song's protagonist decides to immerse himself in the sea, in order to escape man-made calamities such as war and pollution ("1983 (A Merman I Should Turn To Be)"). The next section in the musical arrangement is designed to reproduce the sound of the protagonist descending into the sea, where, we are told, every man "is full of cheer" ("Moon, Turn The Tides... Gently Gently Away"). In the final section, the protagonist wakes from his dream, and we can hear the chaos of the world around him through the heavy musical activity ("Still Raining, Still Dreaming").
Electric Ladyland also includes a number of other compositions and arrangements that Hendrix is still remembered for. These include "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", which involves one of the most recognizable guitar melodies, as well as Hendrix's rendition of "All Along The Watchtower", the song written by Bob Dylan. Hendrix's version was a complete departure from the original, and involves one of the most highly appreciated guitar arrangements in modern music.
Experience breakup
The Jimi Hendrix Experience performed at London's Royal Albert Hall February 18 and 24th 1969, to sold-out concerts which marked the last British performance of the Jimi Hendrix Experience. A Gold and Goldstein-produced film titled "Experience" was also recorded but remains to this day unreleased.
1969 also marked the official breakup of the Jimi Hendrix Experience. Bassist Noel Redding felt increasingly frustrated by the fact that he was not playing his original and favored instrument, the guitar. In 1968, he decided to form his own band "Fat Mattress", which would sometimes open for the Experience (Hendrix would casually refer to them as "Thin Pillow"). Redding and Hendrix would begin seeing less and less of each other, which also had an effect in the studio, with Hendrix playing many of the basslines on Electric Ladyland.
Redding was also increasingly uncomfortable with the hysteria surrounding Hendrix's performances. Redding played his last concert with the band on June 29, 1969 at Barry Fey's Denver Pop Festival, a three-day event held at Denver's Mile High Stadium that was marked by rioting and tear gas. The three bandmates were smuggled out of the venue in the back of a rental truck which was crushed by a mob of fans. The next day, Noel Redding announced that he had quit the Experience.
Legal troubles
Throughout 1969, Hendrix also encountered a number of legal difficulties. Firstly, a contractual dispute arose in relation to an unfavorable agreement that Hendrix had entered into with Ed Chalpin, a producer, long before he became successful. The dispute was resolved when the parties agreed that Hendrix would record an album specifically for Chalpin and that it would be released under his auspices. This was the genesis of the live album entitled Band of Gypsys. Then on May 3, 1969 Hendrix was arrested at Toronto International Airport after heroin was found in his luggage. Hendrix argued in his defense that the drugs were slipped into his bag by a fan without his knowledge, and he was acquitted on that basis.
Gypsy Sun and Rainbows
The Shokan house
After the departure of Noel Redding from the group, Jimi moved into a rented eight-bedroom mansion near the town of Shokan in upstate New York for the duration of Summer 1969. Manager Michael Jeffery covered the rent and expenses, even hiring a chef and housekeeper, with hopes that the respite would produce a new album. To replace Redding, Jimi immediately tracked down Billy Cox, an old and trusted Army buddy who played bass with Hendrix during his Chitlin Curcuit days. The trio of Hendrix, Cox, and Mitch Mitchell fulfilled his last commitment at the time, which was an appearance on The Tonight Show. In an effort to expand his sound beyond the power trio format, Hendrix then added Larry Lee (another old friend from his R&B days) on rhythm guitar, and percussionists Juma Sultan and Jerry Velez. He dubbed the new band Gypsy Sun and Rainbows, although this was never formally announced by Jimi's management. The cohesion of the group in the relaxed, country atmosphere of the Shokan house inspired fresh material like "Jam Back at the House", "Shokan Sunrise", "Villanova Junction", and the funk driven centerpieces of Jimi's post-Experience sound: "Message to Love" and "Izabella".
Woodstock
Hendrix's popularity eventually saw him headline the Woodstock music festival on August 18, 1969. Although a number of the world's most talented and popular musicians were invited to the festival, including The Who, The Grateful Dead, and the Jefferson Airplane, Hendrix was considered to be the festival's main attraction and was therefore scheduled to perform last, on Sunday night.
Hendrix's performance was plagued by administrative and technical difficulties. Due to enormous delays caused by bad weather and other logistical problems, he didn't appear on stage until Monday morning, by which time much of the audience had departed the festival site. Many others merely waited to catch a glimpse of him before leaving. The group was introduced at the festival as The Jimi Hendrix Experience, but early into the set Hendrix conveyed the correct name of the band as Gypsy Sun and Rainbows. Beyond suffering microphone level and tuning problems, it was also apparent that his new, much larger band was not rehearsed enough, and at times simply could not keep up with him. Despite this, Hendrix managed to deliver what is considered to be an historic performance, which featured a highly-appreciated rendition of the Star Spangled Banner, and a solo improvisation which is sometimes considered to be the defining moment of the 1960s.
Star Spangled Banner
The controversial nature of Hendrix's style is epitomized in the sentiments expressed about his renditions of the "Star Spangled Banner", a tune he played loudly and sharply accompanied by simulated sounds of war (machine guns, bombs and screams) from his guitar. His impressionistic renditions have been described by some as anti-American mockery and by others as a generation's statement on the unrest in U.S. society, oddly symbolic of the beauty, spontaneity, and tragedy that was endemic to Hendrix's life.
Hendrix however did not intend for his performance of the national anthem to be a political statement. His comments show that he simply intended it as a different interpretation of the anthem. When taken to task on the Dick Cavett Show regarding the "unorthodox" nature of his performance of the song at Woodstock, Hendrix replied, "I thought it was beautiful," which was greeted with applause from the audience. Rather, it was his latter-career live favorite "Machine Gun" which he intended as a protest song against war.
Woodstock was not the only or even the first time Hendrix played the Star Spangled Banner in concert. It was in fact a setlist staple from fall 1968 through the summer of 1970. Various studio recordings of the song exist as well.
Kidnapping
In September of 1969, Hendrix was apparently kidnapped and held for two days in New York City by men who appeared to be New York mobsters. The standoff ended when associates of manager Micheal Jeffery appeared and peacefully regained custody of the rock star. No police or media reports of the incident exist, but Hendrix himself retold the story often when confiding with friends or associates about his management problems. He believed that Jeffery staged the kidnapping to bolster his role as manager or as a threat of some kind. The incident did occur at a time when Hendrix was at odds with Jeffery over the direction of his career. Most Hendrix biographies make reference to the kidnapping and support the theory that it was staged by Jeffery, notably Noel Redding's autobiographical Are You Experienced? The Inside Story of the Jimi Hendrix Experience.
Band of Gypsys
The Gypsy Sun and Rainbows band was short-lived: after two post-Woodstock shows, some studio time, and an appearance on The Dick Cavett Show, Hendrix disbanded the group, but retained bassist Billy Cox. After attending to the sucessful defense of his drug possession charges in Toronto, Hendrix added drummer Buddy Miles and formed a new trio: the Band of Gypsys. Rehearsing for ten days at Juggy's sound studio, the group gelled quickly and produced a surprising amount original material, including the lively "Earth Blues", which featured The Ronettes on background vocals. Four memorable concerts on New Year's Eve 1969-70 at Bill Graham's Fillmore East in New York captured several outstanding pieces, including one of Hendrix's greatest live performances: an explosive 12-minute rendition of his anti-war epic Machine Gun. The release of the Band of Gypsys album—the only official live recording sanctioned by Jimi—brought to an end the contract and legal battles involving Ed Chalpin.
The second and final Band of Gypsys appearance occured one month later (January 28, 1970) at a twelve-act show in Madison Square Garden dubbed the Winter Festival for Peace. Similarly to Woodstock, set delays forced Hendrix to take the stage at an inopportune 3AM, only this time he was obviously high on drugs and in no shape to play. He belted out a dismal rendition of "Who Knows" before snapping a vulgar response at a female who shouted a request for "Foxy Lady". He lasted halfway through a second song, then simply stopped playing, telling the audience: "That's what happens when earth fucks with space - never forget that". He then sat quietly on the stage until staffers escorted him away. Various angles exist around this bizarre scene - Buddy Miles claimed that manager Micheal Jeffrey dosed Hendrix with LSD in an effort to sabotage the current band and bring about the return of the Experience lineup. Blues legend Johnny Winter said it was Hendrix's girlfriend Devon Wilson who spiked his drink with drugs for unknown reasons.
The Cry of Love band
Jeffrey's reaction to the botched Band of Gypsys show was swift and firm: He immediately fired Buddy Miles and Billy Cox, then rushed Mitch Mitchell and Noel Redding over from England to begin press for the upcoming tour dates as a reunited Experience. Before the tour began however, Jimi nixed Redding from the band and reinstated Billy Cox. Fans and collectors refer to this final Hendrix/Cox/Mitchell lineup as the Cry of Love band, named after the tour.
Most of 1970 was spent mainly recording during the week, and playing live on the weekends. The "Cry of Love" tour, begun in April, (Los Angeles Forum, April 25, 1970) was structured with this pattern in mind. Performances on this tour were occasionally uneven in sound quality, but featured Hendrix, Cox and Mitchell playing new material and playing extended more vibrant versions of older recordings. In contrast though some sound recordings were very good indeed recorded by engineer Eddie Kramer and John Jansen of Wally Heider studios. There are also many others available as bootleg recordings. A show in May at the University of Oklahoma Field House (Norman, Oklahoma) was dedicated to the students killed in the Kent State shootings. The Cry of Love U.S. Tour included 30 performances ending at Honolulu, Hawaii on August 1, 1970.
The album released after Hendrix's death (1972) titled "In the West" featured an outstanding rendition of Chuck Berry's "Johnny B.Goode" recorded live at Berkeley Community Center, May 30, 1970. A 12-minute version of "Red House" taken from a concert at San Diego Sports Arena also on this album shows Hendrix's command of blues at full swing. "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)" along with "Little Wing" are wrongly labelled on the album notes for "In the West" as recordings at San Diego Sports Arena: they were actually part of the February 24, 1969 recordings at the Albert Hall in London. The sound quality is noticeably better on these "In the West" versions than on other releases of "Soundtrack to the motion picture Experience".
A soundtrack to a film called Rainbow Bridge became available on LP in 1971, featuring a power-house version of "Hear My Train a Comin" (this track was released on the more recent album "Blues") and was also recorded at Berkeley Community Center on May 30, 1970. "Hear My Train a Comin" from this concert provides, like "Red House" San Diego and Fillmore East "Stone Free" and "Machine Gun", Hendrix playing at his best. However, the entire album on this occasion was incorrectly labelled, as the recordings for the film Rainbow Bridge were taken from performances in Hawaii (Maui) in July, 1970. The LP Rainbow Bridge featured many tracks which would later appear on "First Rays of the New Rising Sun" including "Hey Baby", with Hendrix announcing "Is the Microphone On?", "Dolly Dagger", "Earth Blues", "Room Full of Mirrors", "Look over Yonder" and a stellar version of "Star Spangled Banner" mixed at the Record Plant which resurfaced on the Purple velvet four-disc collector's set Experience in 2002.
With the opening of Electric Ladyland studios, Hendrix spent more time in the studio and started laying down several new tracks. Some of these would surface much later on the strangely named album "War Heroes", "Loose Ends" and "Cry of Love": see "First Rays of the New Rising Sun".
At a June concert, Hendrix announced that his next LP would come out in "July or August, in either one or two parts." Subsequently some tracks were released as a LP (and CD) "Cry of Love". However, recording sessions for the album, tentatively titled "The First Rays Of The New Rising Sun", continued until he was scheduled to depart for his upcoming European tour. An opening party for Electric Lady was held on August 26, and following this, Hendrix along with Billy Cox boarded an Air India flight for England, joining Mitch Mitchell to commence a European tour.
On September 6, 1970, his final stage performance, Hendrix was greeted by booing and jeering by fans at the Isle of Fehmarn Festival in Germany in a riot-like atmosphere; shortly after he left the stage, it went up in flames during the first stage appearance of Ton Steine Scherben. Billy Cox quit the tour and headed back to the United States after reportedly being dosed with PCP.
Death
On the early morning hours of September 18, 1970, he was found dead in the basement apartment of the Samarkand Hotel, at 22 Lansdowne Crescent, London. He had spent the night with his German girlfriend, Monika Dannemann, and died in bed after taking a reported nine Vesperax sleeping pills and drowning in his own vomit. For years afterwards, Danneman publicly claimed Hendrix was alive when placed in the back of the ambulance; however, her comments about that morning were often contradictory and confused, varying from interview to interview. Police and ambulance reports from the time reveal that not only was Hendrix dead when they arrived on the scene, but he had been dead for some time, the apartment's front door was wide open, and the apartment itself empty. Reports that Jimi's tape "Black Gold" had been stolen from the flat are in fact wrong: they ended up in Mitch Mitchell's possession, having been handed to Mitch by Jimi on 6 cassettes at the Maui concert in July, 1970. His body was returned home and he was interred in Greenwood Memorial Park, Renton, Washington, USA, although Jimi requested to be buried in England. Following a libel case brought in 1996 by Hendrix's long-term English girlfriend Kathy Etchingham, Monika Danneman took her own life.
Legacy
Hendrix's style was unique. Although he synthesized many styles in creating his musical voice, being a visionary, there was something in his playing truly his own. He owned and used a variety of guitars during his career, including a Gibson Flying V that he decorated with psychedelic designs (notably used on "House Burning Down"). His guitar of choice, and the instrument that became most associated with him, is the Fender Stratocaster, or "Strat". He bought his first Strat about 1965 and used them almost exclusively thereafter.
Hendrix's emergence coincided with the lifting of postwar import restrictions (imposed in many British Commonwealth countries), which made the instrument much more available, and after its initial popularizers Buddy Holly and Hank B. Marvin, Hendrix arguably did more than any other player to make the Stratocaster the biggest-selling electric guitar in history. Before his arrival in the U.K. most top players used Gibsons and Rickenbackers, but after Hendrix, almost all of the leading guitarists, including Beck and Clapton, switched to the Stratocaster. Hendrix bought dozens of Strats and gave many away (including one given to ZZ Top guitarist Billy Gibbons). Many others were stolen, and a few were destroyed during the now infamous guitar-burning finales.
The Strat's easy action and relatively narrow neck were also ideally suited to Hendrix's evolving style and enhanced his tremendous dexterity — Hendrix's hands were large enough to fret across all six strings with the top joint of his thumb alone, and he could reputedly play lead and rhythm parts simultaneously. A more amazing fact about Hendrix is that he was left-handed, yet used a right-handed Stratocaster, meaning he played the guitar upside down. While Hendrix was capable of playing with the strings upside down per se, he restrung his guitars so that the heavier strings were in their standard position at the top of the neck. He preferred this layout because the tremolo arm and volume/tone controls were more easily accessible above the strings, but it had an important effect on the sound of his guitar, because of the design of the pickups: thus, his lowest string had a bright sound while his highest string had a mellow sound—the opposite of that intended in the Strat's design.
The burnt and broken parts of the Stratocaster he destroyed at the 1968 Miami Pop Festival were given to Frank Zappa, who later rebuilt it and played it extensively during the 1970s and 1980s. In May 2002, Zappa's son Dweezil put the guitar up for auction in the U.S., hoping it would fetch $1 million, but it failed to sell. The legendary white 1968 Strat that Hendrix played at Woodstock sold at Sotheby's auction house in London in 1990 for £174,000 and resold in 1993 for £750,000. Both it and a shard of the burnt and broken guitar now reside in a permanent exhibit at the Experience Music Project in Seattle, Washington.
Hendrix was also a catalyst in the development of modern guitar amplification and guitar effects. His high-energy stage act and the blistering volume at which he played required robust and powerful amplifiers. For the first few months of his touring career he used Vox and Fender amplifiers, but he soon found that they could not stand up to the rigors of an Experience show. But he soon discovered a new range of high-powered guitar amps being made by London audio engineer Jim Marshall and they proved perfect for his needs. Along with the Strat, the Marshall stack and Marshall amplifiers were crucial in shaping his heavily overdriven sound, enabling him to master the creative use of feedback as a musical effect, and his exclusive use of this brand soon made it the most popular amplifier in rock.
It is believed that the Marshall Super 100 amp, purchased by Hendrix on October 8, 1966, was the first he ever bought. Rich Dickinson of Thrupp, near Stroud, Gloucestershire, bought the second-hand Marshall amp in 1971 for just £65. In May 2005, experts at Marshall Amplifiers in Milton Keynes unearthed photos of the rock star with the amp that proved beyond doubt that it was the genuine article. In a local news story[4], Dickinson said that he had to part with the beloved amp because insuring it would cost thousands.
"I'm not in any rush to sell it and will wait for the best price, not just jump at whoever offers the first silly money," he said.
The amp, of which only four were made, had been fully serviced by Marshall and was to be sold in a private sale. It was believed that it would fetch more than £1 million.
Hendrix also constantly looked for new guitar effects. He was one of the first guitarists to move past simple gimmickry and to exploit the full expressive possibilities of electronic effects such as the wah-wah pedal (his wah of choice was the Dunlop Cry Baby in live performances, though he used a Vox Wah when in the studio). He had a fruitful association with engineer Roger Mayer and made extensive use of several Mayer devices including the Axis fuzz unit, the Octavia octave doubler and especially the UniVibe, a "vibrato" (actually tremolo) unit designed to electronically simulate the modulation effects of the Leslie speaker.
Hendrix's sound is a unique blend of high volume and high power, precise control of feedback and a range of cutting-edge guitar effects, especially the UniVibe-Octavia combination, which can be heard to full effect on the Band of Gypsys' live version of "Machine Gun." He was also known for his trick playing, which included playing with only his right (fretting) hand, using his teeth or playing behind his back, although he soon grew tired of audience demands to perform these tricks.
Despite his hectic touring schedule and his notorious perfectionism, he was a prolific recording artist and left behind more than 300 unreleased recordings besides his five official LPs and various singles.
His astonishing career and ill-timed death has grouped him with Janis Joplin and Jim Morrison as one of contemporary music's tragic "three J's", iconic 60's rock stars that suffered drug-related deaths at age 27 (see The 27 Club) within months of each other, leaving legacies in death that have eclipsed the popularity and influence they experienced during their lifetimes.
In 2003, Rolling Stone magazine named Hendrix number one on their list of the "100 greatest guitarists of all time". [5]
Posthumous releases
After Hendrix's death in London, on September 18, 1970, hundreds of unreleased recordings emerged. Controversy arose when producer Alan Douglas supervised the mixing, overdubbing, and release of two albums' worth of material that Hendrix left in various states of completion. These include the LPs Crash Landing and Midnight Lightning and although they contain several important tracks, the albums are generally considered to be of substandard quality.
In 1972 British producer Joe Boyd put together a film documentary on Hendrix's life, titled simply Jimi Hendrix, which played in art-house cinemas around the world for many years. The double-album soundtrack to the film, including live performances from Monterey, Berkeley and the Isle of Wight, is considered the best of the posthumous releases.
Another LP to emerge in the 1970s was the live compilation Hendrix In The West, consisting of top-shelf American and British live recordings from the last two years of his life, including an outstanding rendition of the concert favorite "Red House" recorded at the San Diego Sports Arena, plus "Johnny B. Goode", "Lover Man", and "Blue Suede Shoes" (soundcheck) at the Berkeley Community Theater May 30, 1970. The album also included "Little Wing", "Voodoo Chile" (recorded February 24, 1969 at the Albert Hall, London), "God Save the Queen", and "Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" (recorded at the Isle of Wight, August 30, 1970). The album notes describe "Little Wing" and "Voodoo Chile" as recordings at San Diego Sports Arena, but that seems unlikely, as these are very good sound quality recordings (possibly taken from the audio channels of a film, "Experience", of the Albert Hall performances).
Although the film Rainbow Bridge is generally regarded as being of minor interest, what was billed as a soundtrack to the film (which it isn't) includes several superb tracks intended for Hendrix's fourth studio album, First Rays Of The New Rising Sun, the never-completed follow-up to Electric Ladyland. The studio tracks, "Dolly Dagger", "Earth Blues", "Room Full of Mirrors" and the melancholy improvised instrumental "Pali Gap", showed Hendrix advancing his studio technique to new levels, as well as absorbing influences from contemporary black soul and funk acts such as James Brown and Sly & The Family Stone.
The Rainbow Bridge album is highlighted by the full-length live version of another of Hendrix's concert performances, a tour-de-force 10-minute electric version of the blues standard "Hear My Train A-Comin." He originally recorded the song in 1967 for promotional film, performing it impromptu as a short but engaging Delta-style acoustic blues played on a borrowed 12-string guitar. The 1970 electric version saw the song transformed almost beyond recognition; like "Machine Gun", it showcased the classic elements of the Hendrix electric sound and featured some of his most inspired improvisation. The track was taped live at a concert at the Berkeley Community Theater in California. An edited filmed segment of this performance was also included in the concert film Jimi Plays Berkeley.
Interest in Hendrix waned during the 1980s, but with the advent of the compact disc, Polygram and Warner-Reprise reissued many Hendrix recordings on CD in the late 1980s and early 1990s. The earliest Polygram reissues are of a poor standard and Electric Ladyland suffered particularly, being evidently a direct transfer from the existing LP masters, with tracks placed out of their correct order. This reflected the original LP running order, an artifact of the days when double-LPs were pressed with sides 1 and 4 on one LP and sides 2 and 3 on the other, so that the records could be placed on an automatic changer and played in sequence by turning the entire stack over.
Polygram subsequently released a superior-quality double boxed set of eight CDs with studio tracks in one four-CD box and the live tracks in the other. This was followed by an excellent four-CD set of live concerts on Reprise. An audio documentary, originally made for radio and later released on four CDs, also appeared around this time, and included previously unreleased material.
In the late 1990s, after Al Hendrix regained control of his son's estate, he and adopted daughter Janie established the Experience Hendrix company to curate and promote Jimi's extensive recorded legacy. Working in collaboration with Jimi's original engineer, Eddie Kramer, the company embarked on an extensive reissue program, including fully remastered editions of the studio albums and compilation CDs of remixed and remastered tracks intended for the First Rays of the New Rising Sun album. To date, the Experience Hendrix company has made more than $44 million from the recordings and associated merchandising. Since his death, over 2 million records of his music have been sold yearly.
Notable live performances
The Jimi Hendrix Experience
- October 13, 1966 - Novelty Club, Evreux, Normandie, France (first Experience show ever)
- June 18, 1967 - The Monterey International Pop Music Festival, California, USA (first appearance and show for the Experience in America)
Gypsy Sun and Rainbows
- August 18, 1969 - Woodstock Music & Art Fair; Bethel, New York, USA
- September 5, 1969 - United Block Association Harlem Benefit, 139 Street/Lenox Avenue, New York City, USA
- September 9, 1969 - The Dick Cavett Show, ABC live television broadcast, USA
Band of Gypsys
- December 31, 1969 - The Fillmore East Auditorium, New York City, USA
- January 1, 1970 - The Fillmore East Auditorium, New York City, USA
- January 28, 1970 - Winter Festival For Peace, Madison Square Garden; New York City, USA
Cry of Love band
- April 25, 1970 - LA Forum; Inglewood, Los Angeles, USA (first Cry of Love concert)
- May 30, 1970 - Berkeley Community Theater, Berkeley, California, USA
- August 30, 1970 - Isle Of Wight Music Festival, Afton, Isle of Wight, UK
- September 6, 1970 - Fehmarn Love and Peace Festival, Mecklenburg Bay, Isle Of Fehmarn, West Germany (last concert ever)
Solo/collaborative
- September 16, 1970 - Ronnie Scott's Club, London, England (jam session, last performance ever)
See also
- Best selling music artists
- Rainbow Bridge concert Maui Hawaii 1970
References
Biographies
- Johnny Black, Jimi Hendrix: The Ultimate Experience, 1999
- Tony Brown, Jimi Hendrix, 2003
- Charles R. Cross, Room Full of Mirrors: A Biography of Jimi Hendrix, 2005: ISBN 1-4013-0028-6
- David Henderson, 'Scuse Me while I Kiss the Sky: The Life of Jimi Hendrix, 1978: ISBN 0-553-01334-3
- James A. 'Al' Hendrix, My Son Jimi, 1999
- Sharon Lawrence, Jimi Hendrix: The Man, the Magic, the Truth, 2004: ISBN 0060562994
- Charles Shaar Murray, Crosstown Traffic: Jimi Hendrix and Post-War Pop, 2nd rev. edition 2001: ISBN 0571207499
- Noel Redding, Are You Experienced?: The Inside Story of the Jimi Hendrix Experience, 1996: ISBN 0306806819
- Keith Shadwick, Jimi Hendrix: Musician, 2003
- Harry Shapiro, Jimi Hendrix: Electric Gypsy, 1995
Other books
- Ken Matesich, Jimi Hendrix: A Discography, 1982
- David Stubbs, Jimi Hendrix: Voodoo Child: The Stories Behind Every Song, 2003
- John Kruth, Bright Moments: The Life & Legacy of Rahsaan Roland Kirk, 2004: ISBN 1566491053
Magazine articles
- Jimpress magazine; Warrington, Cheshire, England
- Univibes magazine; Popiglio, Italy
- Experience Hendrix magazine; Seattle, USA
Interviews
- September 3, 1969 - for United Block Association at "Frank's Restaurant", Harlem, New York City, USA
- February 4, 1970 - at Mike Jeffrey's apartment, W 44th St., New York City, USA
- September 11, 1970 - with Keith Altham at The Cumberland Hotel, Great Cumberland Place, Marble Arch, UK (last interview ever)
External links
- Official Jimi Hendrix website
- Biography and Pictures
- Early Hendrix – pre 1967 recordings
- Jimi Hendrix photo archive by Chris Walter
- Strange Day on Maui_1970
- Extensive set lists for all live and studio recordings
- FBI file on James Marshall Hendrix
- Military records of Private James Marshall Hendrix
- Ask the Axis, a comprehensive database of every known live Jimi Hendrix performance mapped to every known professional or bootleg recording; searchable by song, venue, town, state, country, band line-up, and of course date.
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