Light On Dark Water

52 Guitars: Week 2

Jimi Hendrix may not have been the absolute most proficient guitarist, in the sense of playing extremely fast and complex stuff, ever to play rock. But no one has ever been more expressive. And no one been more influential. More than forty years after his death, he's still revered by guitarists, and even with today's electronics nobody, as far as I know, has ever managed to sound exactly like him.

Some of the stuff on the Experience albums strikes me as weak, apart from the guitar playing–many of the songs just aren't that good, and there's some gimmicky stuff that doesn't hold up well. I've often wished he had recorded other people's material more often. Maybe we would have more killer tracks like "All Along the Watchtower." From this distance in time now it seems to me that his blues playing was some of his best work, though it was not much noticed during his lifetime. There's an album of blues tracks, mostly never intended for release, called simply Blues, (or :Blues?) that might in fact be my overall favorite of his albums. It includes this version of "Red House," one of a number he recorded. I think it's the Experience backing him (Noel Redding and Mitch Mitchell).

 

I didn't hear his music for many years after his heyday in the '60s, but about ten years ago I bought a copy of Blues which renewed my appreciation for him and provoked this blog post. 

Maclin Horton

11 responses to “52 Guitars: Week 2”

  1. Robert Gotcher

    One of my clearest memories from childhood is the radio ad on KOMA-AM for Hendrix’s 1970 show in Norman, OK. I had never heard of him, but I was intrigued by the screeching music. I don’t recall LIKING it, but certainly it got my attention. He died a few months later.
    I was 11.

    Reply
  2. Mac

    Didn’t realize you’re so much younger than I am. I was in college when I first heard Hendrix in 1967.
    I had what I guess you could call a very brief flirtation with a girl form Norman, OK once. Wonder where she is now.

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  3. Grumpy

    Wonderful song.

    Reply
  4. Jesse Canterbury

    Hendrix was indeed among the best ever, and you hit it on the head by pointing out his influence and his blues playing. I have a book called “Forces In Motion,” part-biography, part tour-diary of Anthony Braxton (avant-garde jazz guy). At one point the conversation turns to Hendrix, and everyone in Braxton’s group agrees about how big of an impact he had on them. And these are very much jazz and classical players, but players with a great sort of elemental sense of what makes good music.
    And yes, the blues — even on songs of his that aren’t real blues tunes, he plays tons of blues guitar. So even those songs that aren’t that great as songs still sometimes have some incredible guitar playing.
    Anyway, great post, great series.

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  5. Daniel Nichols

    The great tragedy is that he died so young; I suspect that if he lived he would have gone on to explore his roots even more and would have become one of the all time great blues artists. And you do not mention that in ’67 until his death he was producing sounds from the guitar that no one had ever heard before. Most of these are just givens these days to guitarists, and way easier to get at with the technology available today, but back in the late sixties this was alchemy.

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  6. Mac

    More later, but glad y’all are enjoying it.

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  7. Mac

    I thought everybody knew that–that he was producing sounds nobody had heard before. But it is worth pointing out. And you sort of had to have been there to grasp how startling those sounds were.
    “What if he had lived?” is always an intriguing question. Maybe he would have gotten more rootsy. Maybe he would have gotten further out. Or maybe he would have just faded into mediocrity like so many others. But in any case I consider him one of the all-time great blues players just on the basis of this cd and some other recorded performances. Not much quantity, and he didn’t have anything distinctive to say lyrically, but the playing is so brilliant and innovative, even in these unpolished recordings.

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  8. Mac

    I’ve read things similar to the anecdote about the Braxton group. I can think of at least two jazz guitarists who were obviously (and I think admittedly) influenced by Hendrix: Bill Frisell and Terje Rypdal. I didn’t entirely realize how influential he had been until about 15 years ago when I subscribed for a few years to Guitar Player magazine. Just about every big-name guitarist they interviewed mentioned him as an influence, and they were always having little tutorials on some bit of his sound or style.
    “…even on songs of his that aren’t real blues tunes, he plays tons of blues guitar.”
    Yes, I guess most of it is fundamentally blues-based. A personal experience: I have this blues riff/lick that’ve I’ve been playing on acoustic guitar for a long time (half-intending to build a song on it). And one day I heard “Purple Haze” and realized that “my” lick was pretty much the opening phrase of it, just a bit different rhythmically, and of course in a different world timbre-ly, which was why I hadn’t recognized it.
    “…even those songs that aren’t that great as songs still sometimes have some incredible guitar playing.” Oh yes, definitely.

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  9. Jesse Canterbury

    Miles Davis says in his autobiography that he had talked to Hendrix about some sort of collaboration. That would’ve been something. It’s too bad it never happened.
    I think Hendrix must be for guitarists like Coltrane is for saxophonists. Even if you sound nothing like him & you play very different music, he’s still an influence if only in that you are basically required to know about him if you play his instrument. The influence reaches far beyond as well, though, as we’ve said.
    About your personal experience: that kind of thing happens to composers all the time. My friend — a big sports fan — brought a new tune to our group a few years back. Turned out a big part of it was the ESPN Sportscenter riff, almost exactly. He ended up having to change it.

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  10. Mac

    Heh. I guess I thought real musicians didn’t have to worry about that.
    Miles and Hendrix–that would have been interesting!

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  11. Louise

    Thanks, I enjoyed that.

    Reply

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