Legends never die.
Perfect isn’t a word that is often used to describe an artist because art is subjective. However, many will tell you that Jimi Hendrix was the perfect musician.
His ability to create so freely without self-doubt and never allowing his insecurities to get in the way of his innovative musical output is something many, including myself, marvel at, even still to this day. So to say I was excited upon finding out that there’s still unreleased Hendrix material out there is putting it lightly.
Releasing the third volume in a trilogy of albums that present the best and most significant unissued studio recordings remaining in the legendary artist’s archive, Both Sides of the Sky will arrive March 9th 2018. Liberated by Experience Hendrix and Legacy Recordings, with some help from Janine Hendrix, co-producer John McDermott, and longtime Jimi Hendrix collaborator, engineer Eddie Kramer, the 13 songs that appear on the album (10 of which are previously unreleased) were recorded between 1968 and 1970.
The first album in the trilogy, Valleys of Neptune (2010), earned a top 10 sales ranking in 15 countries, including reaching #4 on Billboard’s Top 200 Album Chart. The follow-up, People, Hell and Angels (2013), peaked at #2 on Billboard.
Both Sides of the Sky is anticipated to complete the spectacular series in epic fashion, according to John McDermott:
“Since Experience Hendrix began its restoration of the Jimi Hendrix music catalogue in 1997, our goal has been to present these important recordings to Jimi’s fans in the best possible quality. We are excited about achieving that. We’ve also been intent on generating album releases which present this amazing music in its proper context.”
So imagine this, I’m sat at my desk minding my own business listening to whatever supposedly new hot band a PR has sent over and up pops an email titled “INVITATION | Jimi Hendrix | Premiere Listening of Both Sides of the Sky“. Instantly, I lose my shit. New Jimi!? Amazing.
But it gets better…
I continue to read further and the invite explains that aside from hearing the new album, there’s also a live Q&A with Eddie Kramer.
The. Eddie. Kramer.
This is the same guy who not only recorded pretty much everything Jimi Hendrix laid down from 1967 onwards, he also recorded “All You Need Is Love” for The Beatles, “Fame” for David Bowie with John Lennon playing rhythm guitar, and he engineered and sequenced six Led Zeppelin albums.
Can anyone say icon alert?
Sending my RSVP back straight away, it was on like Donkey Kong.
So what did we learn from the Q&A with Eddie Kramer and the playback of Both Sides of the Sky?
Jimi Hendrix loved Batman.
There’s song on the album called “Lover Man”. If you listen closely enough you can hear Jimi occasionally chanting “Batman!” According to Kramer, Jimi was a sucker for TV shows . He watched them as often as he could and in particular he loved Batman, starring Adam West. Apparently he wasn’t the only one either, the rest of The Jimi Hendrix Experience loved to tune in too.
He was a chivalrous fella.
If Jimi arrived early to a session he would sneak into the engineer’s booth and stand at the back and absorb everything that was going on around him. No one ever knew he was even stood there. That is until if he noticed a woman stood up in the booth watching the action. The way Kramer tells it, Jimi would nip out and find a chair and bring it back for her to sit on. So not only was he one of the greatest guitarists to ever walk the earth, he was also a gentleman.
His iconic Woodstock performance was recorded in a tractor trailer.
Jimi Hendrix’s live performance at Woodstock in 1969 will forever go down as one of the greatest moments in music history. But did you know that the audio for it was recorded in a tiny tractor trailer? “We were at the back, 250 feet from the stage,” Kramer explained. Going on to admit that there were several complications in recording that iconic performance, one of which included Kramer sometimes being unable to hear what was going on because the feed kept cutting out. We’re just glad he stuck with it. Thanks Eddie!
He hated his singing voice.
While we continue to think he had an incredible voice, one full of raw energy that is unmistakingly Jimi, he didn’t like it. Always complaining about it to Kramer and saying he had the worst voice in the world, he needed to be convinced on several occasions to embrace his gift and to keep recording. How can anyone hate that voice?
Band of Gypsys were formed during the recording of Both Sides of the Sky.
Many of the album’s tracks were recorded by the trio that would come to be known as Band of Gypsys: Jimi on guitar and vocals, Billy Cox on bass, and Buddy Miles on drums. For their first-ever recording session on April 22nd 1969, Hendrix turned to their shared musical root, delta blues. Their previously unreleased, up-tempo reworking of Muddy Waters’ “Mannish Boy” opens the album and sets the tempo for what follows.
“Hear My Train A Comin'” is the last time The Jimi Hendrix Experience recorded together.
The way Kramer tells it, The Experience were coming to the end of their epic run as a collective. The last song they ever recorded together was “Hear My Train A Comin'”. Featured on Both Sides of the Sky, if you listen close you can hear Noel Redding get a little hot and heavy on the bass because he knew he was leaving the band. While it was unfortunate for him it made for one hell of a track, you could cut the tension with a knife.
Jimi believed “Hear My Train A Comin'” was him getting his shit together.
When Kramer found the original session reels that eventually went on to become Both Sides of the Sky, on the box for “Hear My Train A Comin'” Jimi had written: “Getting my ass back together again”. While it’s not completely clear what he meant by it, Kramer thinks this was Jimi identifying that he was returning to form after perhaps a series of lacklustre recordings. But Jimi and lacklustre should never be mentioned in the same sentence… ever!
He never ever, ever, ever played air guitar!
When the Q&A with Kramer got opened up to the floor, one question that was asked was whether or not Jimi ever played air guitar. Let’s just say the legendary engineer and producer burst out in hysterics and continued to laugh for at least a good 30 seconds before snapping back with, “No! Of course he bloody didn’t!” Proceeding to state that Jimi was rarely ever without a guitar, he never really needed to pretend.
Eddie Kramer is the reason Electric Lady Studios were built.
Jimi Hendrix and his manager Michael Jeffery bought a nightclub called The Generation in Greenwich Village, New York in 1968. Jimi wanted to build an 8-track into it, as well as many other expensive things. He consulted with Kramer on how best to go about it and he just turned around and point blank told him not to do it and instead he should build a studio, somewhere where he could record, therefore ridding himself of the astronomical costs he was paying out at the time. It was at this moment Electric Lady Studios was born, designed by John Storyk.
“Stepping Stone” used to be called “I’m A Man”.
It’s unclear as to why, but track four on Both Sides of the Sky, titled “Stepping Stone”, was apparently originally called “I’m A Man”.
Jimi listened to classical music in his spare time.
I managed to get my own question in for Eddie Kramer, and it was: “We rarely ever hear about what it was Jimi Hendrix was listening to himself during the creation of his music, if anything. Did you ever hear him listening to anything other than his own music?” Taking a second to think about it, Kramer then said that during the Electric Ladyland sessions he once went to visit Hendrix at the Dakota Hotel in New York and when he opened the door there were classical records all over the floor. “He was a fan of Brahms and other such like composers because they helped chill him out, apparently,” Kramer explained.
He didn’t have an ego.
Before the popular rendition of Crosby Stills, Nash & Young’s reworking of Joni Mitchell’s “Woodstock”, there was an original version that Jimi Hendrix played a part in, and it’s featured on Both Sides of the Sky. Also recorded with Buddy Miles, Jimi had no problem in taking a backseat according to Kramer. Fronted by Stephen Stills, the song actually hears Jimi play bass on the backing track. He was essentially a session musician for four minutes and there wasn’t a hint of ego in the air.
He often wrote songs by compiling lines he had scribbled down on hotel notepads.
You’d think the way in which Jimi Hendrix wrote his often groundbreaking songs would have been intricately calculated, right? Wrong. Kramer claims that Hendrix would often scribble down a line or two on hotel notepads, receipts, and matchboxes and just stuff them into his bag or back pocket. Then he’d arrive at the studio and just start pulling them all out and arranging them in a way that lyrically made sense. Genius.
The song “$20 Fine” was composed by Stephen Stills and was originally called “$30 Fine”.
“$20 Fine” is a song on the album that was originally composed by Stephen Stills. Changed to “$20 Fine” from “$30 Fine” when cut with Jimi Hendrix, Stills did cut a demo of the original song with Crosby Stills & Nash but it was never released until much later when it landed on a boxset released in the 90s.
Both Sides of the Sky is the last of the Jimi Hendrix unreleased studio sessions.
Informing us that these are the last Jimi Hendrix studio sessions left in existence, after a huge sigh from those in attendance Kramer then proceeded to add that there might be some unreleased demo tapes and live performances knocking about he could work on next. But with a Cheshire Cat-esque grin spreading the length of the stage, he added, “Maybe there is, maybe there isn’t.”
Both Sides of the Sky is released March 9th 2018 via Experience Hendrix and Legacy Recordings. Pre-order here for CD, LP, Download
