Jimi Hendrix: Experience the Legend

Jimi Hendrix – musician, singer/songwriter, producer, was an astounding guitarist and widely regarded as one of the best electric guitarists of all time.

Heavily influenced by B.B. King, Muddy Waters, Albert King, and Curtis Mayfield, he pioneered the use of amplifier feedback and popularized use of the wahwah pedal.

Hendrix’s first instrument is believed to have been a ukelele that his father found while cleaning a garage. He began learning acoustic guitar shortly after his mother’s death when he was fifteen and quickly mastered the instrument. A year later his father gave him a white Supro Ozark electric guitar. Being left-handed, Hendrix found it necessary to re-string the guitar in reverse. In later video, he is often seen playing a right-handed Stratocaster upside-down.

Hendrix played mostly unpaid gigs with several bands before enlisting in the Army. It was while stationed with the 101st Airborne at Cambellton, KY that he met bassist Billy Cox, when Cox heard Hendrix playing guitar in the service club. The two formed a friendship and started jamming at clubs around Clarksville Tennessee. After leaving the service, Hendrix decided to try to make a living as a musician and went to Nashville, where he and Cox played with a band called the King Kasuals.

Hendrix left the band and headed for New York in 1964, taking up residence in Harlem where he landed a job as guitarist in the Isley Brothers’ backup band. Hendrix left Isley Brothers’ in late 1964 when they toured Nashville and soon teamed up with Little Richard, taking on the stage name Maurice James. During his time with Little Richard, he recorded sessions and performed with several other artists and made his first recorded TV appearance in Nashville on the show “Night Train”.

Things did not go well personally between Hendrix and Little Richard and in late 1965 Hendrix headed back to New York where he played a short stint with Curtis Knight and the Squares. He then formed his own band, The Blue Flame, which played regularly at Cafe Wha? in Greenwich Village.

In early 1966, Keith Richards’ girlfriend, Linda Keith, became friends with Jimi and introduced him to Chas Chandler, bassist for the Animals. Chandler had recently left the group and was looking for a band to manage. He took Hendrix to London where they formed the Jimi Hendrix Experience with bassist Noel Redding and drummer Mitch Mitchell. While in London, Hendrix was asked to sit in on the song The Killing Floor during a performance by the group Cream. Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, and Brian Jones all were impressed with Hendrix and became huge fans of his.

The Jimi Hendrix Experience’s first single was a cover of the ’60s rock standard “Hey Joe”, with the flip side bearing Jimi’s first original, Stone Free. It was an instant success in the UK. In 1967 Purple Haze and Wind Cries Mary were released, also topping the British charts. In May 1967 they released their first album, Are You Experienced, which would have made it to number one in Britain had it not coincided with the release of Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club band by the Beatles. At his last concert in London before returning to the US, with a delighted Paul McCartney and George Harrison sitting in the audience, Hendrix performed his own rendition of Sgt. Pepper.

Back in the US, the Experience had difficulty making a name for themselves until McCartney recommended them to the organizers of the Monterrey Pop festival. This got them the exposure they needed in the US and Hendrix fame skyrocketed. While playing gigs at the Scene in New York City, Hendrix met Frank Zappa and became intrigued with Zappa’s new wahwah pedal; incorporating one into his own music going forward.

After recording two more albums – Axis and Electric Ladyland, the band started falling apart, ostensibly as a result of Hendrix’s tendency toward perfectionism. During this time, Jimi frequently turned up at jams with B.B. King, Jim Morrison, among others. When Noel Redding left the bad in April 1969 Jimi invited his old army buddy Billy Cox to be their bass player.

In August of 1969 the group performed at Woodstock as the newly named “Gypsy Sun and Rainbows”. They played a two hour set, with Hendrix breaking a string while continuing to play through “Red House”. They ended with the now famous improvisation of the Star Spangled Banner.

In late 1969, Band of Gypsys was recorded and produced under the name Heaven Research in order to fulfill a contract dispute with one of Hendrix’s early managers.

In spring of 1970, The Jimi Hendrix Experience reunited for the Cry of Love tour, with Billy Cox replacing Noel Redding on bass. During this time Hendrix, also played lead guitar on the recording of Stephen Stills’ Old Times Good Times. In September 1970, during the European leg of Cry of Love, that Hendrix met his untimely death from a drug overdose.

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