Jimi Hendrix fans received an early gift over the weekend thanks to Experience Hendrix, LLC and Legacy Recordings. The companies partnered to release the latest Jimi Hendrix Experience live recording, Jimi Hendrix Experience: Aug. 18, 1967 on CD. The 10-song recording is yet another welcome addition to any Jimi Hendrix (and Jimi Hendrix Experience) fan’s music library. That is due in very large part to the liner notes in its companion booklet. It is not usual for liner notes to set the foundation for any recording, but in this case, they do. The concert’s set list and the group’s performance thereof is also of importance to its presentation and will be discussed a little later. The recording’s audio production rounds out its most important elements and will also be addressed later. Each item noted is important in its own way to the whole of the presentation. All things considered they make Jimi Hendrix Experience: Aug. 18, 1967 a really key part of the history of The Jimi Hendrix Experience that any listener will appreciate.
Jimi Hendrix Experience: Aug. 18, 1967, the latest live Jimi Hendrix Experience concert recording from Experience Hendrix, LLC and Legacy Recordings, is an impressive new presentation that deserves plenty of its own applause. That is due in no small part to the liner notes featured in its companion booklet. Penned by Jeff Slate and spanning 20 pages complete with rare photos of Hendrix at the concert, the liner notes offer a rich history of how the Hollywood Bowl concert happened. Audiences will be surprised to learn that what was only The Jimi Hendrix’s second live American concert (its first was at the Monterey Pop Festival) happened really thanks to none other than Sir Paul McCartney, according to Slate’s notes. He writes that McCartney contacted Michelle Phillips (of The Mamas and the Papas) at the time and recommended adding Hendrix and his fellow musicians – bassist Noel Redding and drummer Mitch Mitchell – to the bill. This after The Jimi Hendrix Experience had dropped off a previous run with The Monkees that saw that band gain more acclaim than Hendrix and his friends. This is only contemplation but maybe McCartney’s role in getting Hendrix and company on the Hollywood Bowl bill was the reason the trio opened its show with a cover of The Beatles’ ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.’ Maybe it was a tribute to McCartney and his band as a show of respect. Again that is only supposition.
Also of note here is Slate’s revelation that when The Jimi Hendrix Experience took the stage at the Hollywood Bowl, Jimi was “disheartened and sometime sardonic “as he talks to the audience between songs because allegedly the audience was not reacting too excitedly to the band’s performance. Here is the thing: While the recording’s audio production is impressive in its own right, it does not do well in capturing the audience’s reaction. Audiences can hear the band quite well but not the audience. So not being able to hear the audience leaves audiences wondering just how lackluster the audience’s reaction was to the band and its performance. Maybe a future re-issue of this recording will make that clearer. At the same time, knowing the band’s second live American performance was received in such fashion versus the role that the band still plays in the modern history of music makes this revelation all the more hard hitting.
Speaking of lackluster response, the opening notes of how lackluster the response was in America to The Jimi Hendrix Experience’s singles at the time – ‘Purple Haze’ and ‘Hey Joe’ – as the stage is set for the story, no pun intended. Slate writes of the songs that while they had received quite a bit of acclaim overseas in Europe, “both were largely ignored by AM radio and had little commercial impact” in the United States. That really enriches the picture that Slate paints of where The Jimi Hendrix Experience was at a the time in America. This trio was essentially at the very beginning of its rise even despite the lack of response from media and audiences. It makes the band’s performance all the more valuable and appreciated. Between this revelation. The others noted here and the rest of the history Slate provides in his notes, the overall history that he provides makes for so much engagement for audiences. It forms the foundation for this recording, and a strong foundation at that.
Building on that foundation is the set list for this concert. As noted already, the nine-song set list opens with a performance of The Beatles’ ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.’ Again, one can only wonder if opening the show with that song was a tribute to The Beatles since it was essentially thanks to McCartney that The Jimi Hendrix Experience was added to the Hollywood Bowl lineup. From there, the band also includes the noted singles, ‘Hey Joe’ and ‘Purple Haze’ at different points in the set along with the likes of ‘The Wind Cries Mary,’ ‘Fire,’ Foxey Lady,’ ‘Wild Thing,’ ‘Killing Floor,’ ‘Catfish Blues’ and a cover of Bob Dylan’s ‘Like A Rolling Stone.’ Going back to Slate’s notes about the audience’s lackluster response to ‘Like A Rolling Stone,’ most set lists are determined for concerts ahead of time but considering what Slate writes about the audience’s reaction, but one cannot help but wonder if the band took on the song in an attempt to better connect with the audience, who had originally come to see The Mamas and the Papas (another folk act like Dylan). Again, this is all supposition. It is just interesting that the band would add in cover of a folk tune in its lineup alongside so many more rock-leaning works of which audiences likely were less familiar.
The band’s performance of its set list is of its own importance here because again, it is difficult to really gauge the audience’s alleged reaction (or lack thereof) to the group’s performance since the audio does not fully capture the audience noise. The band puts its full energy into each song, especially as it launches into ‘Fire.’ Redding really gets to shine here even as a backup vocalist. It is a rare performance here in which Redding becomes more prominent. He even gets moments when he gets to introduce the songs. Maybe this is in reaction to Hendrix’s alleged discontented reaction to the audience’s own reaction. The jam sessions that evolve in some of the songs are so rich and organic, making for so much entertainment in their own right. As the show closes with ‘Wild Thing’ audiences hear Hendrix state that the song was dedicated to “us” perhaps meaning the band. The tone he uses as he makes the exclamation is interesting. It makes one wonder if that was a sign of his discontent at the audience’s reaction to the band. Either way, that moment and the others noted here work with the rest of the performance throughout the show to make the band’s overall performance of the concert just as enjoyable as the concert’s set list itself.
As much as the concert’s set list and the band’s performance thereof does for this recording (along with the liner notes), there is still one last element to examine. That element is the recording’s audio. As noted, the audio is rich in its own way. The raw, organic sound from the mics is so powerful, even in its remastering for this recording. It creates such a welcome sense of nostalgia and as a reminder of how far recording technology has come in the nearly six decades that have passed since the concert was held. It shows without a doubt that despite what so many vinyl hipsters want to believe, it is possible to transfer tapes to CD from such an era without any loss at all and make for so much engagement and entertainment just from sound. At the same time though, the recording does fail to fully capture the audience noise. The result is that it is difficult to really quantify the audience’s alleged lackluster reaction to the band’s performance. Now while that is a negative here, it is hardly enough to doom the recording. It just would have been nice to have had that aspect of the concert, so as to fully grasp how the event really went down, how the audience really received the band. Keeping all of this in mind, the audio production exhibited in this recording actually still does just as much positive for the presentation as the liner notes, set list and the band’s performance thereof even despite its one issue. All things considered all of the examined elements join to make Jimi Hendrix Experience: Aug. 18, 1967 a mostly successful new presentation that Hendrix fans and rock fans in general will appreciate.
Jimi Hendrix Experience: Aug. 18, 1967, the latest live Jimi Hendrix Experience recording from Experience Hendrix, LLC and Legacy Recordings, is a largely positive new live recording from the band’s archives that audiences will find appealing. That is due in large part to its liner notes. The liner notes, penned by Jeff Slate, lay the groundwork for the concert contained in the single-disc presentation. It gives a rich history of how the concert came to be and also outlines how important it was to the band’s eventual rise to fame in the United States. The concert’s set list and the band’s performance there of make for their own share of engagement and entertainment, adding even more to the overall appeal here. The audio, while not perfect, still creates a welcome sense of nostalgia among audiences and also as an argument point against this rise in the popularity of vinyl. It shows vintage audio can be (and has been for a long time) transferred to CD without any loss, making for just as much warmth in the sound, and depth. Each item examined here is important in its own way to the whole of Jimi Hendrix Experience: Aug. 18, 1967. All things considered they make Jimi Hendrix Experience: Aug. 18, 1967 another largely live Jimi Hendrix Experience recording that audiences across the board will enjoy.
Jimi Hendrix Experience: Aug. 18, 1967 is available now. More information on this and other Jimi Hendrix releases is available at:
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