Jimi Hendrix Albums (22)
'An Evening with the Jimi Hendrix Experience'
Release Date 2/1/2005
Tracks 19
Label Purple Haze
See Album Tracklist and Review
'Live in Copenhagen'
Release Date 10/18/2004
Tracks 7
Label Radioactive [UK]
See Album Tracklist and Review
'The Rainbow Bridge Concert -- The Late Show'
Release Date 1/1/2003
Tracks 7
Label Radioactive
See Album Tracklist and Review
What The Critics Say
The concert held at Haleakala Crater in Hawaii in July of 1970 was supposed to be part of the film Rainbow Bridge, but very little of the concert footage was used in the film. Stranger still, none of it was used on the soundtrack album Rainbow Bridge. The set has been bootlegged in the past, but this marks the first official release of this material. For the second set, Hendrix played new material exclusively, except for "Red House." He also played a Gibson Flying-V instead of his near-trademark Fender Stratocaster, giving him a thicker guitar tone. Hendrix starts strong on "Dolly Dagger" and goes straight into "Villanova Juction" (here simply titled "Instrumental"). This is followed by one of the better live versions of "Ezy Rider," with Billy Cox lending strong support on bass. After an excellent version of "Red House," Hendrix loses his way a bit, drifting into "Straight Ahead" during "Jam Back at the House," but finished the tune strong with all his effect pedals working nicely together. The set ends with an up-tempo jam tacked onto the end of "New Rising Sun." This is quite an interesting live set, because the intimate venue and relative lack of commercial pressure allowed Hendrix to relax on-stage with a lot of his newer material. Sound quality is quite good, although the drums are a bit distant. Some critics have said that Hendrix's playing declined after the breakup of the Jimi Hendrix Experience, but this set shows that Hendrix was always moving forward, incorporating new tones and effects as well as Spanish scales into his playing. There were certainly some lackluster performances during that time period, but the Rainbow Bridge concerts show that Hendrix still had some excellent playing left in him. [Both sets are also available combined onto a two-CD set.] ~ Sean Westergaard, All Music Guide
'The Rainbow Bridge Concert -- The Early Show'
Release Date 1/1/2003
Tracks 9
Label Radioactive
See Album Tracklist and Review
What The Critics Say
The concert held at Haleakala Crater in Hawaii in July of 1970 was supposed to be part of the film Rainbow Bridge, but very little of the concert footage was used in the film. Stranger still, none of it was used on the soundtrack album Rainbow Bridge. The set has been bootlegged in the past, but this marks the first official release of this material. The first set kicks off with "Lover Man," and has Hendrix running through a handful of newer tunes before finishing the set with several "old favorites." Things start off loose, though not disinterested, but by the time he's into "Hear My Train a Comin'," Hendrix is absolutely on fire. Even old warhorses (to Hendrix), like "Fire" and "Purple Haze," get inspired performances, a far cry from some of the more perfunctory performances of those tunes in 1970. Sound quality is quite good, although the drums are a bit distant. Some critics have said that Hendrix's playing declined after the breakup of the Jimi Hendrix Experience, but this set shows that Hendrix was always moving forward, incorporating new tones and effects as well as Spanish scales into his playing. There were certainly some lackluster performances during that time period, but the Rainbow Bridge concerts show that Hendrix still had some excellent playing left in him. [Both sets are also available combined onto a two-CD set.] ~ Sean Westergaard, All Music Guide
'Blue Wild Angel: Live at the Isle of Wight'
Release Date 11/12/2002
Tracks 11
Label MCA
See Album Tracklist and Review
What The Critics Say
After having been released in a couple different configurations (not counting bootlegs), Jimi Hendrix's performance at the Isle of Wight Festival has been released yet again, and it's a bit of a mixed bag. Hendrix is plagued by equipment problems and audience expectations, and the entire festival had degenerated into something of a debacle by the time Jimi hit the stage as headliner. There is a loose, at times sloppy, feel to the proceedings, with Hendrix being pretty casual with the lyrics, particularly in "Spanish Castle Magic." Jimi had long since tired of playing his smash hits, even commenting at one point, "Y'all want to hear all those old songs, man? Damn, man. We're just trying to get some other things together." The problem was that much of the new material was under-rehearsed for a live setting, giving some of the newer songs like "Dolly Dagger" more of a jam feel. In addition, Hendrix's amplifiers are picking up transmissions from radio and security personnel throughout the show, which actually works well on "Machine Gun," but is distracting elsewhere. That being said, collectors will still be happy with this release. The sound is fantastic, and the packaging and booklet are filled with great photos. Jimi's guitar playing is superb in spots, and his wonderful sense of humor is on display throughout. The fact is that Hendrix died way too early, so any great-sounding, even mediocre shows will still be celebrated by fans for the moments of brilliance they contain. Band of Gypsies is still the first pick for live Hendrix, but those who crave more will be quite pleased with Blue Wild Angel: Live at the Isle of Wight. [The complete show is available as a two-CD set.] ~ Sean Westergaard, All Music Guide
'Wild Blue Angel: Live at the Isle of Wight'
Release Date 1/1/2002
Tracks 18
Label MCA
See Album Tracklist and Review
'The Rainbow Bridge Concert -- Both Shows'
Release Date 1/1/2002
Tracks 16
Label Purple Haze
See Album Tracklist and Review
What The Critics Say
The concert held at Haleakala Crater in Hawaii in July of 1970 was supposed to be part of the film Rainbow Bridge, but very little of the concert footage was used in the film. Stranger still, none of it was used on the soundtrack album Rainbow Bridge. The set has been bootlegged in the past, but this marks the first official release of this material. The first set kicks off with "Lover Man," and has Hendrix running through a handful of newer tunes before finishing the set with several "old favorites." Things start off loose, though not disinterested, but by the time he's into "Hear My Train a Comin'," Hendrix is absolutely on fire. Even old warhorses (to Hendrix), like "Fire" and "Purple Haze," get inspired performances, a far cry from some of the more perfunctory performances of those tunes in 1970. For the second set, Hendrix played new material exclusively, except for "Red House." He also played a Gibson Flying-V instead of his near-trademark Fender Stratocaster, giving him a thicker guitar tone. Hendrix starts strong on "Dolly Dagger" and goes straight into "Villanova Juction" (here simply titled "Instrumental"). This is followed by one of the better live versions of "Ezy Rider," with Billy Cox lending strong support on bass. After an excellent version of "Red House," Hendrix loses his way a bit, drifting into "Straight Ahead" during "Jam Back at the House," but finished the tune strong with all his effect pedals working nicely together. The set ends with an up-tempo jam tacked onto the end of "New Rising Sun." This is quite an interesting live set, because the intimate venue and relative lack of commercial pressure allowed Hendrix to relax on-stage with a lot of his newer material. Sound quality is quite good, although the drums are a bit distant. Some critics have said that Hendrix's playing declined after the breakup of the Jimi Hendrix Experience, but this set shows that Hendrix was always moving forward, incorporating new tones and effects as well as Spanish scales into his playing. There were certainly some lackluster performances during that time period, but the Rainbow Bridge concerts show that Hendrix still had some excellent playing left in him. [Also available on two 180 gram vinyl LPs.] ~ Sean Westergaard, All Music Guide
'Rare as Love'
Release Date 4/18/2000
Tracks 15
Label Dressed to Kill
See Album Tracklist and Review
'Live at the Fillmore East'
Release Date 1/1/1999
Tracks 16
Label Experience Hendrix
See Album Tracklist and Review
What The Critics Say
A series of Jimi Hendrix performances from the Band of Gypsys concerts finally gets the deluxe treatment from MCA and Experience Hendrix, as tapes from both first and second shows are brought together, correctly identified (1986's Band of Gypsys 2 actually featured three tracks that weren't by the band at all) in one deluxe two-disc set. This newly expanded edition contains the only live versions of "Earth Blues," "Auld Lang Syne," "Stepping Stone," and "Burning Desire"; Hendrix tunes specifically worked up for the performance that rarely surfaced again like "Izabella," "Power of Soul," and "Who Knows"; newly remastered versions of "Stop" and "Hear My Train a-Comin'" (both originally presented on Band of Gypsys 2 in horrendous sound) and classic performances of "Stone Free," "Changes," "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)," and "Wild Thing." Equally as revelatory is one of the two alternate versions included of "Machine Gun," every bit as stunning as the better-known version. Though this new edition hardly makes all previous incarnations obsolete, it presents the man at his most challenged and brilliant. ~ Cub Koda, All Music Guide
'First Rays of the New Rising Sun'
Release Date 4/15/1997
Tracks 17
Label MCA
See Album Tracklist and Review
What The Critics Say
Posthumous reconstructions of unfinished works are inherently dangerous, principally because even the most capable scholar or producer can only make, at best, an educated guess as to how the work in question would have been completed. Indeed, in dealing with some such pieces, you're sometimes lucky to get the work of the artist claimed (the Mozart Symphony No. 37 is a case in point -- it doesn't exist; the piece once labeled Symphony No. 37 and attributed to Mozart is now known to have been authored by Michael Haydn); and while there's no question that the songs on this CD were recorded by Jimi Hendrix, even the people who worked on the sides with him can't say which songs would have ended up on the finished version of First Rays of the New Rising Sun (assuming that he even ended up using that title for the album), or what embellishments he would have added to any of them in the course of completing them, or even if he might not have totally reconsidered such matters as tempo and approach to any of them. In the end, First Rays of the New Rising Sun is a little like any of the various "performing editions" of Gustav Mahler's never-completed Symphony No. 10, in that what's here is impressive, but may have little to do with what would finally have been heard by the public, had the artist lived to finish it -- we don't know if Mahler would have scored a particular passage for horns or strings, or Hendrix would have put another, different lead guitar part, or a second (or third) guitar part on to any of these songs, or added choruses, or re-thought his vocal performance? Hendrix had gone so long between albums, seemingly adrift stylistically at various times, that there's no telling exactly what direction he was finally going to end up working toward. All of that said, this is a superb album, and a worthy if very different, earthier successor to Electric Ladyland's psychedelic excursions -- the later tracks, ironically enough, cut at that album's long promised and long-delayed studio namesake -- and also show him working in some genuinely new directions. For starters, Hendrix's voice emerges here as a genuinely powerful instrument in its own right -- his voice was never as exposed in the mix of his songs as it is here; partly this is because Hendrix and engineer Eddie Kramer never finished embellishing the songs, or completed the final mixes. But whatever the reasons, the change is refreshing -- Hendrix's voice is not only powerful and expressive throughout, but a more melodic instrument than it seemed on his earlier releases; indeed, hearing these sides is a bit like listening to those middle-years Muddy Waters recordings when Chess Records had the Chicago blues legend abandon his guitar playing in favor of concentrating on his singing; the results might not be what all fans expected, but it sure sounds good, because it turns out that Hendrix had an expressive voice and was also moving his music into new areas that were stimulating him. A lot of the material here shows Hendrix, for the first time, moving his songs specifically into a black music idiom, embracing R&B and funk elements in his singing, playing, and overall sound; some of it could qualify as Hendrix's extension of his years playing with the Isley Brothers. Songs here such as "Freedom," "Izabella," "Angel," and "Dolly Dagger" show him finally acknowledging that musical world that he had largely by-passed, and the closer, "Belly Button Window," is one of his most successful traditional bluesy outings. The psychedelic workouts are more jam-like and experimental, and the ballads are prettier and even more dreamlike in their background soundscapes. "Astro Man" also captures a light moment for the artist, as he opens the guitar workout with a quote from the Mighty Mouse theme song, sotto voce beneath the guitar. And speaking of the guitar, despite the prominence of Hendrix's vocals on a lot of this album, the guitar playing is pretty much up to the standard that one would expect, if not necessarily the final versions of some of the songs. Most of the material on First Rays of the New Rising Sun surfaced among the various posthumous Hendrix LPs issued from the 1970s through the early 1990s, but a lot of it was tampered with, mostly in the form of posthumous overdubbed embellishments supervised by producer Alan Douglas -- all of that has been stripped off and the multi-track masters retrieved and restored. What he would have eventually come up with and released as his next musical statement is anyone's guess, but this gets you as close to that answer -- and that vision -- as you're ever likely to get. It is the best representation of where the songs were at the point that he died, and it's fully competitive, in terms of merits and surprises, with his trio of completed studio albums. ~ Bruce Eder & Cub Koda, All Music Guide
