It was 1967 at the Monterey Pop Festival and the Jimi Hendrix Experience just made their US debut in which they defined the event as ebullient,loud and colourful.Hendrix has just finished playing their own rendition of "Wild Thing" (originally by the Troggs) and much to everyone's surprise,Jimi knelt down before the sacred instrument,poured some lighter fluid and set fire on it.He by then,destroyed the guitar afterwards.
It took a while for Jimi Hendrix to convince the American people that he was indeed one of them and not some English eccentric that has been bombarding the country since 1964 when the Beatles first stepped on US soil thus highlighting the rise of Beatlemania and the beginning of what would be a long term British Invasion of the United States.
James Marshall Hendrix was born in Seattle,Washington on November 27,1942,long before the city became one of rock music's sacred places.As a child,his left handedness was already noticed that he had to put the guitar upside down to be able to play it.After a brief spell in the army as a paratrooper where he was discharged because of a certain back injury,he drifted off from club to club and from one band to another,playing guitar on who will ever notice him.
One particular band was called Jimmy James and The Blue Flames,they had played several gigs in the Club au Go Go,where bands like the Rascals and the Doors have also hung out later on.Hendrix was then discovered by Chas Chandler,who is a former bass player for the Animals.Upon seeing Hendrix play,Chas thought that Hendrix's gifts would somewhat be appreciated in a smaller pond.He by then took him to London and got in touch with two English musicians: bassist Noel Redding and drummer Mitch Mitchell,and thus the Jimi Hendrix Experience was soon formed.
Upon arriving in London in 1966,everyone was in awe with Jimi's guitar style that made the locals look pretty humble with their so-called craft.The band soon released their debut album
Are You Experienced? in 1967 and was considered to be one of the greatest hard rock albums ever produced even up to this day.
Songs like "Hey Joe","Purple Haze" swiftly became Hendrix's signature songs,hence,became the yardstick on how rock music is measured by its heaviness and thus became a prerequisite to every guitar school that taught advance skills on the instrument.
Hendrix became notorious in his live performances and for a while became the Who's rival on destroying these expensive hardware when he opened for the band in mid-1967.Pete Townshend was heard to be saying "he[Hendrix]totally blew us away".When the Beatles released Sgt Pepper in the summer of that same year,he opened his set at the Marquee with a version of the album's title track.Paul McCartney was said to be pleased with the tribute calling it "the most beautiful tribute he has ever heard of".McCartney,while we're on the subject,is actually the man responsible for having Jimi on the bill at the Monterey Pop Festival mentioned here before.It is a matter of question whether Linda Eastman[who later on became Mrs McCartney] had talked to Paul directly about Jimi as Hendrix was already friends with her [as she was a known rock photographer] even before she and McCartney met.
Following their successful US debut,the Jimi Hendrix Experience was booked to be an opening act for the Monkees' concert tour.The tandem however,was disastrous for the group as Monkees fans expressed their dislike over the band with parents even complaining that Hendrix's stage acts were vulgar.Nevertheless,the tour has gained publicity for Redding,Mitchell and Hendrix himself,igniting further curiosity and later on huge album sales for the band.
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| The Jimi Hendrix Experience |
The band by then released their second album
Axis:Bold As Love with its tracks remaining as staples for budding rock guitarists of today.The album's engineer was Eddie Kramer who would also work later on with
Led Zeppelin on their second album in 1969.
The third album however,would put Jimi and his group to the top of the charts and thus,into much controversy:the third album by the way was called
Electric Ladyland where the music was far more adventurous,not to mention its lurid cover.The gatefold sleeve covering the original vinyl release is composed of several naked women of almost all races.The album went straight to number one in the charts in 1968,and an alternate cover however, was released in the US.45 years after its release,the album remains one of the most influential in rock music as it went to number one on the gatefold sleeves list on
ultimate classic rock .
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| The original gatefold sleeve of Electric Ladyland |
Problems with the group however started to rise regarding member rankings.Well,the Experience have always sounded to everyone as a Jimi Hendrix solo with backing musicians,and yes,the truth is Redding and Mitchell never got any control over the material the band was playing.In the band's albums,Hendrix had always written and sung the songs and on Electric Ladyland,Hendrix was given an additional credit for "direction".Noel Redding,on the other hand,feeling more of a tea boy status,rebelled and the result was the breakup of the band-much to the disappointment of their fans.
Hendrix went on to form another band which he called
Band Of Gypsies with Billy Cox on bass and Buddy Miles on drums.The band performed only two concerts in which the second was stopped in the midway by the man himself.
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| Jimi Hendrix (photo:ABC News) |
Even with a band or not,Hendrix has proven his prowess as a guitar god that would make him the smash hit of Woodstock in 1969.The three day event in which he highlighted his performance by playing a guitar rendition of America's sacred song-The Star Spangled Banner.It was rumored however that the applause that can be heard on the film was edited right in after Hendrix's performance of the national anthem.It was said that after Jimi had finished playing,the audience was stunned in catatonic silence,shocked on Hendrix's butchery of the song.As a writer who wasn't born yet during that time,I guess I will need to clear that rumor out especially from those people who were actually there.Were the people really shocked at Jimi's guitar rendition of the Star Spangled Banner? Or were they(the gossip writers at that time) just cashing in on some rumors that didn't even occur?
Its still a matter of an open verdict whether Jimi took his own life or not,but it was painfully clear that when he died in the early hours of September 18,1970,he took several tablets of sleeping pills contrary to the usual recommended dose of one half.Hendrix died in his sleep after inhaling his own vomit.Close friend Eric Burdon who was also the lead singer for the rock group the Animals was said to have got hold of a poem written by Hendrix days before he died which bore traces of a suicide note.
For a man with awesome prowess and unique guitar style,one can clearly say that no one has ever gone near to what Jimi Hendrix had achieved.Playing guitar with his teeth,on top of his shoulders and between his legs became the signature of the man who would later be crowned as one of the greatest guitar virtousos in the entire history of rock music.
Jimi's remains were flown back to Seattle where a funeral was held and he was laid to rest at Greenwood Memorial Park in Renton,Washington-about 11 miles southeast of Seattle.Among his pallbearers were his former bandmates in the Experience Noel Redding and Mitch Mitchell,jazz musician Miles Davis,and notable blues musicians John Hammond and Johnny Winter.He was buried in a small family plot and in 1999 was later transferred to a memorial built by his dad Al where his grandmother Nora and stepmother Ayako was also buried.His mother Lucille,who died in 1958 was buried not far from the memorial.A sad thing happened that the elder Hendrix never got to see the completion of the memorial he envisioned as far back as 1970,Al died in 2002 at the age of 82.
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| Jimi Hendrix Memorial Greenwood Memorial Park,Renton,WA |
An estimated number of 14,000 people visit Hendrix's memorial every year most notably during Jimi's birthday November 27 and during christmastime according to his website.At the time of his death,Hendrix only managed to record and release four studio albums.A number of posthumous Hendrix projects have surfaced years after he passed away--with some of the recordings merely half finished and was either remixed or polished in the studio.
Several compilation albums also flooded the music market with Jimi's family keeping a tight grip on his back catalogue after his dad Al spent years of court battle to gain control of his management and finances.While his former bandmates in the Experience were upset on how things went along with the copyright war-->a year before he passed way,Noel Redding mentioned in an interview of not having the slightest percentage he and Mitchell thinks they deserve on the copyright royalties and how sad they were that they weren't given the credits they think they deserve as Jimi's dad Al took full control of his late son's estate.
Sadly,both his bandmates in the Experience has joined up with him in the afterlife as well.Noel Redding died in 2003 of complications from cirrhosis of the liver while drummer Mitch Mitchell passed away in 2008.
However,the latest effort of Jimi from beyond the grave was
People,Hell And Angels released on May 5,2013--making Hendrix far from being obsolete.The album contains unreleased tracks Jimi has planned to release after the much success of Electric Ladyland.
People,Hell And Angels peaked at number two on the charts and has earned new generations of young Hendrix fans from all over.
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| Hendrix's posthumous 2013 album People Hell And Angels |
Most of the bands and artists from the 1960s have brilliantly left their mark on rock music as their style and unique interpretation of their finest craft continues to amaze people even those who weren't born yet during this much noted cultural revolution in the entire history of rock genre.
As Jimi's guitar burns in that very stage of the Monterey Pop Festival,his flame as virtuoso continues to burn as well.
(c) Keith Vernon Adagio
