What does it sound like?:
By all accounts the original recording was a victim of a fairly wasted organisational team at the gig meaning a fair amount of digital magic had to go into this reissue to get it up to scratch. Whilst I’ve heard better sounding live albums it’s not bad. Apparently the drums suffered from terrible wind noise in the mics so Mitch Mitchell recreated his performance in the studio afterwards which is going some. It’s fair to say it’s rather thin sounding, truth be told.
Anyone who is familiar with Jimi and especially live Jimi will know what’s in store here, sensational guitar playing with the odd side order of duff notes and out of tune riffage, such being the cost of breaking all the rules. I think it sounds bloody great actually. I especially like the fact that there are live versions of tracks which turned up on “The cry of love”, the much maligned album pieced together after Jimi’s death but which I’ve always liked a lot.
Jimi chats quite a bit and it’s always good to hear that stoned slurred sounding hippy stuff coming from him.
What does it all *mean*?
It means the seemingly inexhaustible market for songs people already have in some numbers is alive and well. Personally I’m quite resistant to having multiple versions of things for completeness sake but although last year’s “Freedom” is close to definitive live Jimi there are tracks here I don’t have live and the version of “Hear my train a comin’” is almost worth the price of admission on its own (Billy Cox brilliant on bass on this too).
Goes well with…
Doing stuff. Anything really, but I like to be active when I’m listening to Jimi. It’s easier to play air guitar when you’re standing up.
Release Date:
20th November 2020
Might suit people who like…
It’s facile to say great guitar playing as that could apply to many people/albums but this is one of the last shows Jimi played so it’s a chance to hear where the greatest guitar innovator had got to before his Strat was prematurely silenced.
From deadhendrix:
“Late ’69 was a bad time for everyone, not least the wretched Mike Jeffery, whose managerial relationship with Hendrix was a cake left out in the rain. Hendrix was working independently with Alan Douglas, using him as a shield to avoid a fight. Jeffery, acutely aware of the fragility of his situation, dreamed up a movie that would overtake Easy Rider, and – finally – get him the respect he was due. And the chicks. And the bread. And the chicks. With wannabe director Chuck Wein (previous credit: My Hustler, for Andy Warhol. Later credits: none) he scribbled an outline of Rainbow Bridge on the back of a crack whore (possibly), and got Warners to bankroll the project. Yes, they were strange times, and we shall not see their like again. Wein and Jeffery, natural cinematic geniuses both, were way beyond outmoded Hollywood clichés like story and character, so the project soon started to look like Janine’s astrological tour schedules for Spinal Tap. In a savage act of desperation to save the movie (and his own sorry ass), Jeffery coerced Hendrix into an open-air concert on Maui, footage of which would be crowbarred into the movie, and provide the soundtrack Jeffery needed to leverage a better deal out of Warner’s. Hendrix, of course, was disgusted with the whole deal. Kramer and Mitchell were unhappy with the Maui recordings, an inferior performance beset by technical problems, and asked for the remaining multi-tracks in Warner’s vaults, from which only “Look Over Yonder” and “Star Spangled Banner” were selected. Jeffery scratched “Stepping Stone” and “Izabella” from their list, because he wanted “Hear My Train A’Comin’” from the movie on the album, so he could call it a soundtrack. This was important, because back in ’67, Jeffery, as standard industry practice, had a clause in his contract which stipulated Warners would have first option to buy any soundtrack material, but wouldn’t have automatic rights to it. When Warners, antsy for a new Hendrix album, were presented with what was arguably not a real soundtrack at all, they went ballistic, but had to eat shit at Jeffery’s table again.
Soon after Hendrix’s, uh, unexpected death, the movie premiered to great cries of indifference from the handful of people (mostly projectionists) who saw it. Even hacked from 120 to 75 minutes, the movie was still a generous 75 minutes too long. Jeffrey’s “soundtrack” was finally released in October ’71, when a puzzled public embraced the album with less enthusiasm than The Cry Of Love …”
Harsh. I rather like the “soundtrack” album. Film is sh*t, though.
I don’t see any critique of the album here, harsh or otherwise. It’s how the movie came to be, and how the “soundtrack” album came to be. I like it too.
Ok. I’ll let you off on the “soundtrack”. 👀
Large of you.
I’m all heart. 😆
The title of the album pains me – Maui is an island: it should be ‘Live ON Maui’.
It was supposed to take place ‘in’ a volcano Colin.
Nice review! I’ll be listening to it but I doubt I’ll be shelling out for the privilege.
“Cry of Love” is my go-to Jimi alongside the BBC tracks and the b-sides.
Anyway, got a bit of news … the ever-deliberately-obscure-for-obscurity’s sake 331/3 book series (started well, meandered with little purpose, plummeted badly – think “Wayne Rooney’s career”), actually have a worthwhile entry coming some time in the next year or so … no, really.
The Bands of Gypsys’ album.
Band of Gypsys… JUST the right side of 1970 for you, Deza…
,Cry of love is my go to Jimi also. I dont really understand why it is slagged off.
I suspect because there was a market in redefining it “the way Jimi would have wanted” to varying degrees of credibility. I got to love it before all that toss and still do.
They’ve done a great job restoring footage from this gig. What’s immediately noticeable is how few people were there: it’s like a church fete, with kids playing in front of the stage and people wandering past as Jimi lets fly cosmic mayhem.
I love the Cry of Love album and don’t think it has been bettered as far as a Hendrix posthumous studio album is concerned. One thing I find interesting with Jimi is that the ‘signature’ Hendrix guitar sound copied by everyone from Robin Trower to Stevie Ray Vaughan is not the scuzzy fuzz tone of the first three albums but the spacey Univibe, Band-of-Gypsys sound of this era, captured only posthumously in the studio. Just like how the signature George Harrison sound (melodic, harmonised slide) is nowhere to be found on a Beatles album but is all over George’s solo output.
Similarly, the Elvis that impersonators the universe-wide choose to emulate is not the 50s hillbilly cat but the 70s burger king. Which is strange, frankly.
Probably because most Elvis impersonators are the same vintage as the 70s burger king.
That’s a good point.
I listened to it, and it sounds odd. Without really knowing the background, I would say that this is a mix of direct recordings (or re-recordings) of drums and bass, with vocals and guitar from either a live desk or possibly a bootleg, where they have sort of filtered out the drums and bass. It sounds really weird… and yet… quite enjoyable.
The film of this is on BBC2 tonight at 9pm for anyone interested.
Interested.