June 30, 2000
New York, NY -- A sprawling box set of predominantly unreleased Jimi Hendrix material is slated for release by Experience Hendrix/MCA this fall. Due Sept. 12 (to coincide with the thirtieth anniversary of Hendrix's death, Sept. 18) the four-disc, fifty-seven-track The Jimi Hendrix Experience is intended to serve as both a document for fans and an introduction to Hendrix and his music.
"We wanted this to be an overview, a window into the life of a genius," said Janie Hendrix, Jimi's sister and supervisor of the family-sanctioned reissues. "We wanted to show how certain songs evolved into what we know today. Like at one point, 'Angel' and 'Little Wing' were at one time the same song before they split into two."
Contrasting this box with more carefully crafted releases such as The Beatles Anthology, John McDermott, who helped assemble the Hendrix box and wrote the liner notes, said that the goal was to reveal the work -- "every significant chapter" -- in its rightful context. "Jimi was improvisational," he said. "You could get vastly different takes on different days. Every time you turned on the tape machine you would get something really imaginative."
And since, according to Janie Hendrix, the guitar great "always had a little tape recorder with him," the constantly running tape picked up much of the guitar god between 1966 to 1970.
Of those that were released, some of the different versions of the same songs originate from out-out-print albums like In the West, Rainbow Bridge, Loose Ends and Stages. Unique combinations abound, such as a live blend of "Hey Baby" and "In From the Storm." The "new" tracks include "Title #3," a basic up-tempo instrumental track recorded during the Are You Experienced? sessions, but never revisited; "Taking Care of No Business," described as "a tongue-in-cheek blues workout" from the Axis: Bold as Love sessions; "It's Too Bad," a long, personal blues composition recorded with drummer Buddy Miles and organist Larry Young; "Country Blues," a jam with Miles and bassist Billy Cox; "Come Down Hard On Me," a track intended for his fourth studio album; and "Cherokee Mist," an ancestor of "In From the Storm."
Several other new songs remain in the vaults, Janie Hendrix said, to be released along with familiar material in the future. She also said that second-string albums like 1972's War Heroes and 1968's prematurely titled Smash Hits would come out in their original configuration, but that the tide will slow. "It may seem like we were flooding the market," she said, "but we wanted to get the core albums out quickly, along with a few other things. From here on in, the new stuff will come out about once a year."
Written by CHARLES BERMANT for RollingStone.com News
