It’s not that Jimi Hendrix ever really left us, his extraordinary sound has never been absent from the airwaves. It seems, however, that Hendrix is making another comeback, some 40 years after his early passing in 1970 at the age of 27.
Ultimate Hendrix Part of Another Jimi Revival
In the last few years, much of Hendrix’s unfinished music, newly remixed, has appeared as “officially released bootlegs.”. A documentary on his life and another on the Making of Electric Ladyland have also helped renew interest in the guitarist’s guitarist,. In addition, several books, including Charles R. Cross’ biography Room Full of Mirrors, and the latest: Ultimate Hendrix (2009).
Backbeat Books’ Ultimate Hendrix is a large volume, subtitled An Illustrated Encyclopedia of Live Concerts and Sessions. At first glance it may look like a coffee-table edition, but it’s really more of a reference book…probably the one Hendrix fans have been waiting for, considering its depth, and wealth of “new” information.
Written by author/producer John McDermott, with input from longtime Hendrix producer Eddie Kramer and Billy Cox (bassist for Band of Gypsys, Hendrix’s last band) Ultimate Hendrix documents every concert performance from 1963 to his death in 1970, and every studio session between those shows. Given the amount of time Hendrix spent doing either one or the other (nearly every day), this book is essentially a log of his professional life.
While the concert listings here are interesting, most are fairly brief. A typical entry lists the venue, the opening acts, and about half of them have playlists. Some (maybe a quarter) discuss the actual performance, but the rest of the information is lost to time.
Ultimate Hendrix a Goldmine of Studio Session Insight
It is really the studio session entries where Ultimate Hendrix makes its mark. Most of these entries are extensive and insightful, drawing on musicians & recording engineers’ comments and even Jimi’s own running commentary off the actual tapes.
At one point during the Axis: Bold As Love album sessions, producer Kramer had been experimenting with “phasing,” an effect first heard on The Beatles’ “Baby You’re A Rich Man.” but not in stereo. Jimi, always on the lookout for new sounds, had been on Kramer to attempt to create an “underwater” sound he’d dreamt. McDermott writes: “They decided to try the process on ‘Bold As Love.’ Kramer asked Hendrix to listen to the sound he wanted to introduce. Upon hearing phasing, Hendrix exclaimed ‘That’s it! That’s the sound I’ve been hearing in my dreams!’”
This is the type of stuff hardcore fans can realty sink their teeth into, and this informative textis full of it. In addition to all of the above live and studio performance listings, Ultimate Hendrix contains about 75 great photos/illustrations, many of them posters for the shows listed within, many of them also previously unpublished.
In Ultimate Hendrix: An Illustrated Encylopedia of Live Concerts and Sessions, Backbeat books and John McDermott have brought to Hendrix fans a reference like no other, one long overdue, and one those fans will likely find indispensible.
McDermott, John with Kramer, Eddie & Cox, Billy. Ultimate Hendrix: An Illustrated Encyclopedia of Live Concerts and Sessions, 2009, Backbeat Books, 256 pages. ISBN: 978-0-87930-938-1.
Dale Van Every - Dale Van Every is a freelance and fiction writer living in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He earned his Masters Degree in English Literature from ...
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