The first two Hendrix albums featured only one track each passing the five-minute mark, whereas Electric Ladyland was a double album with tracks reaching a whopping 15 minutes in length, each taking up an entire side of vinyl to themselves. READ MORE: The Jimi Hendrix Experience // ‘Are You Experienced?’ at 50 years oldįrom a simple comparison of track listings, it is immediately clear that Electric Ladyland was something new. He had transformed Jimi into one of the world’s biggest stars, but now it was time for Hendrix to do his own thing, on his own terms. Whilst Hendrix was clearly having a blast in these days, rarely seen without his trademark wide-brimmed hat and a smile even wider still, it was clear that by 1968, Chandler’s work was finished.
1967’s Are You Experienced? and Axis: Bold As Love, both recorded in London, were packed with short, snappy explosions of psychedelic pop, bursts of colour from the very British palette of David Hockney and Peter Blake. The Jimi Hendrix Experience’s first two albums both had a strange Britishness to them, owing to Chandler’s influence. He had discovered the guitarist in New York and brought him to London, but he had taken Jimi as far as he could. In many ways, Chandler’s departure set Hendrix free. In one case, Hendrix’s taxi driver was even invited into the studio, and ended up staying for a six-hour jam session. The Electric Ladyland sessions were a world away from Chandler’s previous experience as a member of The Animals: whereas their classic hits such as ‘House Of The Rising Sun’ were often recorded in one quick take, Hendrix’s perfectionism and his harem of groupies meant that time and money were going down the pan. Chas Chandler, the producer and manager who had first discovered the unknown Hendrix and mentored him, quit after tiring of the guitarist’s infamous indulgences, having surrounded himself with obsequious fairweather friends and various hangers-on. As one of rock music’s most influential figures, there can never be too much said about this extraordinary piece of work.Įndless touring, recording, and chemical fatigue of the last two years had put great tension on Jimi and his band, which ultimately could not take the strain of the Electric Ladyland recording sessions at New York’s Record Plant. It is his third album, Electric Ladyland, that is remembered as his magnum opus.
Skip forward just two years, and the reincarnated Jimi Hendrix had moved to London, recorded three albums, and achieved legendary status. Jimmy James is slogging it out on the Chitlin’ Circuit, just another blues guitarist trying to make a living as a gun for hire, moonlighting in backing bands for the likes of Little Richard, Curtis Knight and The Isley Brothers. Picture a seedy New York City basement club, 1966.
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