| Identifier | 2698539 |
| Created At | Tue May 23 2023 23:54:00 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time) |
| Media Type | Shn |
| Media Count | 1 |
| Source Info | SBD -> ? -> CD -> EAC -> SHN |
| J-Card Comment | Jimi Hendrix 08-18-1969 Woodstock Woodstock, NY Source: SBD -> ? -> CD -> EAC -> SHN Eac'd and Shn'd by Twice (corey.langlois@verizon.net) 04/20/02 --------------------------------------------------------------- Disk 1 01. Intro 02. Message To The Universe 03. Hear My Train A Comin' 04. Spanish Castle Magic 05. Red House 06. Mastermind 07. Lover Man 08. Foxy Lady 09. Jam Back At The House 10. Izabella 11. Gypsy Woman~Aware of Love 12. Fire Disk 2 01. Voodoo Child (slight return) 02. Star Spangled Banner 03. Purple Haze -> 04. Jimi Imnprov 05. Villanova Junction Blues Encore 06. Hey Joe 07. Interview With Jimi on 08-19-69, NY,NY Notes: 18th August, 1999 marks 30 years to the day since Jimi's landmark appearance at the Woodstock Festival in Bethel, NY. Scheduled to appear late the night of Sun. the 17th (the last official day of the fest), the schedule was so behind that he ended up going on at 8am Mon. morning (they've since claimed that they waited to put Jimi on till daylight so people wouldn't be leaving in the dark, but it's more likely just the way it ended up). The band had been rehearsing for only a week or so at Jimi's rented retreat in nearby Boiceville and would only play in public twice more, it a Harlem street fest and at the Generation Club (later to be Electric Lady Studios) both in NYC the following month. The band here shows it's lack of rehearsal but there's certainly some brilliant moments. The classic quote on their preparedness came from Gerry Stickells when he said that "..rehearsals, as they called them, consisted of getting stoned and talking about how great it was going to be.."! It had only been 7 weeks since the final Experience show. The band Jimi assembled consisted of Larry Lee, a old friend and fellow guitarist from Memphis, old Army buddy Billy Cox, with whom Jimi had already been doing some playing as the Experience wound down (including a Tonight Show appearance the previous month), local percussionists Juma Sultan and Jerry Velez (whom, though mic'ed, are generally unheard, probably because the mics are both on-axis of Marshall cabs), and Mitch, who'd apparently been brought in at the last minute to give it a bit of cohesiveness. A good move as it gave Jimi the Experience material to fall back on, Billy having done his homework well on the older stuff. Much of this concert has been discussed to death so I'll try to briefly hit some of the high points as I see em. Still, can only be so brief as at just under 2 hours, I believe this stands as Jimi's longest single performance. (Setlist) Message To The Universe; Hear My Train; Spanish Castle Magic; Red House; Mastermind; Lover Man; Foxy Lady; Beginnings; Izabella; Gypsy Woman; Fire; Voodoo Child (SR); Star Spangled Banner; Purple Haze; Woodstock Improvisation; Villanova Junction; Hey Joe Jimi corrects the 'Experience' stage introduction to give the band's name as "...Gypsy Sun and Rainbows...nothing but a Band of Gypsys...". Apologizes for the first of many times for their lack of rehearsal, saying they'll be doing "primary rhythm things...but it's a first ray of the new rising sun...we must start from the earth, which is the rhythm...when you get your woman, that makes the melody...". Jimi would mention the 'first rays' again later in the set, and the early morning set, under the literal first rays of the sun, seems a good metaphor for this new phase in Jimi's body of work. 'Message to the Universe', as it is referred to by Jimi afterward, is an early version of the track most know as 'Message To Love' and is the very first outing as it's own song (Jimi had introduced the riff at a couple of Experience shows as parts of other song/jams). Jimi is using his recently acquired Univibe pedal here and it will remain on for almost the entire set, with Jimi changing the speed setting now and then. A very rough opening gives way to the familiar groove but without the tight arrangement that Jimi would officially release on 'Band of Gypsys' the following year. He's still experimenting with the lyrics, my favorite 'rough draft' being "Find yourself first, and then your tool..."! The tune also features a nice vocal/guitar 'scatting' interlude. He and Larry work a little double lead into the end section and it grinds to a halt without the familiar chromatic climb. After Jimi mentions the name of the song, he calls it "...something to get the rats out of your bums and knapsacks..."! Jimi intro's HMT as "a little jam we've been messing with back at the house...we think we'll call it Getting My Heart Back Together". At this point it has, in fact, been in his live set for over a year (with an early version as far back as BBC '67). Good playing throughout. Jimi apologizes for delay in "getting things together" and calls for the sound crew to turn up the mics after a shouted request for same (everyone's an expert...). He explains that it's just "the first rays, so there's a whole lot more to go". He launches into 'Spanish Castle Magic'. SCM is often a vehicle for improv and this one is no exception. A touch of cowbell gives it a nice drive but it's mostly lost in the mix. Larry takes a respectable solo around 3:00 and then we get some trades between him and Jimi. Jimi adds some of his 'sliding octaves' and the guitars trill together before giving way to a short bass/drums/percussion interlude. The guitars re-enter around 6:30 and Jimi alternates solo lines with the open B and E string tags from the main riff, Larry echoing same. Jimi builds it up to the final verse and takes a last solo with Larry continuing the open E and B strings under. Jimi apologizes yet again, saying he's sorry for being out of tune and says "we don't want to play too loud for you" then adding with his patented comedic timing "...therefore we'll just play very quietly and out of tune..."! Larry's tuning problems are the most pervasive (and infamous) here but Jimi does have tuning problems of his own, he's just had a *whole* lot more practice at dealing with them! Also, I do think that the mahogany body and neck of Larry's Gibson was (and they still are) much more susceptible than Jimi's Strat to the changes as the humid summer morning heated up. Be that as it may.... Jimi kicks off 'Red House' quicker than usual, and using the Strat's bridge pickup for a much twangier sound though he changes to the neck pickup after the first couple of lines. He uses the wah for awhile on the fills starting with "Wait a minute something's wrong...". Juma's maracas can be heard faintly- a little louder and more locked in with the highhat would sound nice IMO, but just the type of arrangement detail they had no time for. Jimi starts his regular solo very cleanly and plays a nice one but he breaks his high E string and pulls back, turning over the lead to Larry for a full 3 choruses. Unclear exactly how/when Jimi changes the string as he can be heard playing rhythm under Larry and there's no evidence he played any guitar besides THE white Strat but he manages somehow. Larry's a pretty good bar-band blues player and does a competent job but of course in the presence of Jimi's greatness there's no way he could ever measure up. One does hear a little of Jimi in Larry's playing and it may be as uch the other way around as it's been said that Larry showed Jimi a few things on guitar way back in the post-Army days. Naturally it would've been just a small part of Jimi's musical education but the fact that Larry was in the band on this day proves, to me, at least a measure of indebtedness in Jimi's mind. Anyway, Larry stops soloing after 3 verses, leaving Jimi's rhythm playing. When Jimi realizes that Larry's done soloing he mixes in some lead lines to finish the 12 bars before his final verse. As it happens, Jimi finishes this solo on a similar trill to the one with which he ended his first 12 bar solo (where he breaks the string) so the official releases (and even some bootlegs) have only the one 12 bar break by Jimi edited directly onto the final vocal verse. Jimi flirts with a double-time feel during the last verse. 'Mastermind', a Larry Lee original which he sings, is up next. A simple medium tempo Soul/R&B ballad, it doesn't have a whole lot going for it but is significant in that it shows Jimi's generosity in letting his old friend have a moment in the spotlight. Larry's guitar is badly out of tune but he has a pleasant voice and turns in a fairly confident vocal performance, especially considering how nervous he must've been in the situation. Jimi adds some nice Wes Montgomery- inflected octave lines throughout but stays in the background. Some brief backing vocals by Jimi and Billy (?) are weak though I find them sorta endearing in a way as they support their old crony.... No doubt sensing that they've lost a bit of momentum, Jimi launches straight into 'Lover Man', last performed with Billy on the Tonight show the previous month but not in a full concert setting since MSG 5/69. Larry takes a couple of rounds of solo after the first chorus then Jimi takes over as Billy slips into the 'Jam 292' riff (later to anchor their 'Flight of the Bumblebee' interludes in LM). Jimi sings the older "..rock (also 'roll') me baby.." line over the outro, even slipping in "..look over yonder.." once before the familiar ending. Hard to believe in hindsight, but this by-then old concert warhorse was still new to many concertgoers' ears as it didn't see a release until 'Hendrix In The West' a year posthumously, though the earlier 'Rock Me Baby' version would appear on the Jimi/Otis Monterey album in '70 ('Hear My Train' is another then-staple that still hadn't been on record at the time of Woodstock- it would first appear, in the form of the Berkeley version, on 'Rainbow Bridge'). 'Foxy Lady' gets dedicated to a girl in the yellow underwear in the "amen section", then Jimi says in one of his comic voices "I remember you from last night, baby!" followed by "I see the dirty old man licked your bicycle seat...", the last comment probably getting a big laugh from the band but, gee, for some reason was left off the official releases! Larry sticks to some 7th chord accents and Billy does some nice variations on the bass line for an effective take on the old crowd-pleaser, though Jimi's guitar cuts out briefly at a couple of points and gives a nasty crackle during the reprise of the opening sustained note. Nice coda, tho. Afterward, Jimi mocks himself and the band for not having it together then jokes that the crowd "..waited all morning...maybe by tomorrow morning we'll have something together...". Jimi introduces 'Jam Back At The House' as just that. This has also been called 'Beginnings' and at one time had Mitch officially credited as the author, though for some strange reason the credit became Jimi's over the years. This is, though, in large part a band composition/jam, probably the only true group collaboration represented here and a hint at directions this band could've taken had it held together better and longer. Though some of the sections tend to go on a bit long, there are some nice meshing of the drums and percussion (though you see Jimi telling Jerry to lay out during the drum break!) and quite a bit of double guitar work, simple though it is, with Larry. Larry is also featured in the first solo, holding his own despite a persistent squeal from his pickups. This solo is one of Larry's few that made it into most official releases, though he still gets no respect as during the video the cameras show Jimi's hands and even faces in the crowd, but not one second of Larry during his own solo! Jimi takes over for some quite jazz-inflected lines over some cleverly worked-out changes. Despite the repetitive riff, I've always thought the last section to be very intense in it's buildup. This song would only be performed once more, at Maui 7/70, and there would be a studio version cut around the same time with Juma back on board for the session. 'Izabella' gets the longest spoken intro of the morning. After thanking the crowd for their patience (with 3 days of peace love and soundzzz...), Jimi introduces it with a rap about a soldier singing about his girl and problems arising when people are insecure because they're not in love, winding up with "..the other half of a man is a woman...we'd like to play a thing called Izabella and don't you ever forget it". Then, off mic you hear Jimi say something like "... you all are hard headed...where's Billy Graham, he'll set you straight". Maybe he's talking about some technical snafu and saying Bill Graham the promoter would run a tighter ship, or maybe he's talking about crowd members not paying attention in Electric Church and how they could learn something from evangelist Billy Graham ? We can only guess. You see Jimi literally count the frets up to where he starts the riff. Playing the opening riff before the band enters, we see some mighty fine dance steps from Jerry behind his congas! This is the first ever public appearance of the song (only other public outings would be the Cavett TV show the following month and the first BoG show) and it suits the band very well and is one of the set highlights IMO. While not quite as 'in the pocket' as the later studio version, it still moves nicely and Jimi does some great soloing, including a section with his teeth around 2:30. Jimi mentions that they've "never stood this far from each other except when our mothers cut us in half when we was siamese twins"! He then wonders aloud what song they should do. As audience members shout every title imaginable, we hear Jimi say "...wanna do that Impressions?...". What follows is a slightly rough but fascinating rendition of Curtis Mayfield's 'Gypsy Woman', sung very competently by Larry. This represents Jimi, Billy and Larry reaching back to their mutual roots and it really points up the immense influence Curtis had on Jimi's guitar style. Jimi's Univibe'd guitar slips n' slides n' slithers behind the vocals, unifying the song and providing a textbook example of his hybrid style with the thumb covering the bass and the fingers embellishing the partial chords on top. Mitch lays back a bit, probably not knowing the song too well, and the percussion is more prominent than anywhere else in the set, a little cluttered but still adding a pleasant flavor and giving the song an almost bossa nova type groove at times. Jimi can be heard providing some backing vocals on the title line. They modulate into a tag of what is apparently another Larry penned song called 'Aware of Love'. This one is a real gem and is such a shining link in Jimi's personal and musical legacy that it's a pathetically short-sighted shame that it's been left out of all official releases. All hail the tape traders and bootleggers...... Knowing he needs to mix the old and new, Jimi kicks it quickly into 'Fire'. Mitch is clearly glad to be back on familiar ground and drives the song nicely and, as always, benefits greatly from the soundboard recording (especially the recent remaster). During the chorus Jimi looks over expecting backing vocals but they don't seem forthcoming... After thanking the crowd yet again for their "patience and waiting all these three years", he gets ready to wrap it up and announces the by-now fairly standard set closer VC(SR) as "...the new American anthem until we get another together...". What follows is one of the most devastating 30 real-time minutes in the annals of electric guitar. VC follows the standard form, with Jimi unleashing an aggressive solo as Billy switches to the climbing bass line as heard near the end of the Experience renditions. Around 5 minutes in he pulls back to some cleaner chunkier riffs and introduces the band members before the final verse. At 8:30 Larry is given a brief solo but he pulls back after a minute or so, no doubt fully aware that it's completely Jimi's show from here on out. Jimi thanks the crowd again and wishes them all peace and happiness (repeating the latter 3 times). After a short double time section Jimi starts the words to 'Stepping Stone', a very first outing for the embryonic song which he would develop over the coming months. He even has the first change in mind but the band stays on the E chord. He does some clever scat singing at 11:30, harmonizing with the guitar, then briefly flirts with an Izabella type riff before telling the crowd "we're just jamming, you can leave if you want to". Larry and Jimi start a tandem guitar riff which goes a little out of sync. Although that probably wasn't intended, I've always thought the resulting 'echo' effect sounded really cool! Jimi winds thing up with a short 'dental coda'.... ...segueing into THE famous version of Star Spangled Banner. I really can't add anything to the reams that have been written about this, but there are two things that have always stood out for me. When I first saw the Woodstock movie in a theatre way back in 1970, I'll never forget (and still marvel at) the moment when Jimi hits those 'banshee wails' during the 'rockets red glare' section (occurs at 1:22). The camera shows only his face and he leans back and opens his mouth as if he's screaming the sounds himself (actually, he sorta is). I remember seeing that at 13 years old and thinking "this guy really *is* from another planet"! The other thing I think of a lot is that last 'word' of the "oh say can that star spangled banner yet waaaaaave" at 3:00, when the note sustains and morphs through at least 4 distinctly different feedback overtones. Still jaw dropping at +30! Purple Haze follows as it had, and would, at many a show with a relatively straight reading. One unusual thing is that Jimi pronounces the first tag line as 'kiss the sky' when he almost always goofed on it as 'kiss this guy', even driving it home here by kissing upward! A typically fast n' fiery solo coda.... ...morphs into an absolutely devastating 4 minute solo excursion commonly titled 'Woodstock Improvisation'. We get a raw stream-of-consciousness look at Jimi's guitar genius, moving through flamenco flavoured lines, multi fret pull offs, modal movements against drone strings, and some textbook examples of simultaneous lead/bass playing with Jimi's thumb providing a moving bass line. Hidden within are recognizable snatches of (mostly kernels of songs to be developed) Bolero, Valleys of Neptune, Send My Love To Linda, Stepping Stone and Drifting, then... ....he seamlessly switches gears to wind up the set proper with the serene benediction of 'Villanova Junction Blues', a gentle Am blues which could almost be the (Voodoo) child of BB King's 'The Thrill Is Gone'. This had showed up briefly at the MSG 5/69 show and in a few jam sessions. It would crop up in later shows and even a studio version but to my ears none match the dreamy, laid back flowing quality of this one. Jimi's guitar glides across the changes with jazzy octaves and sliding intervals (and even a very cool above-the-nut bend of the G string up to the root A at 1:02), all with his patented fat clean bell-like tone (prime example around 1:27, the notes popping out with his unique picking action of fingers coming up from below the strings, plucking as much in/out as up/down). Pure genius, then he leaves the stage with a simple "thank you". There's a postscript, though, as the band gets called back for a rare (for Jimi) encore. There are the inevitable cries for 'Wild Thing', which people knew from the Monterey Pop movie though how anyone could want to, or expect to, see Jimi wreck a guitar after what they'd just witnessed is beyond me. Jimi says a few words about trying to leave behind the old stuff and says they're going to try 'Valleys of Neptune' but then immediately changes his mind, saying he forgot the words (Damn, so close! It would never be performed live but would go on to be, IMO, one of the most promising works-in-progress he left behind). He idly riffs for a few seconds then pulls out an old one after all, 'Hey Joe'. A pretty straight reading, complete with the old 'I Feel Fine' quote (twice) and a tune-up snuck in at 2:45. Jimi does a quite aggressive first solo with wah and the second with a very bassy and cleaner sound, winding up on the chromatic climbing riff. yhus ends Jimi's set, the Woodstock festival and, some would say, the innocence of an era...or was it just the First Rays? Beyond any assigned cultural significance, certainly a historic Jimi show. Chris |
| Trades Allowed |
Performance
| Jimi Hendrix 1969-08-18 Woodstock Festival, Bethel, NY | |
|---|---|
| Set 1 | Message To Love Hear My Train A Comin' Spanish Castle Magic Red House Mastermind Lover Man Foxy Lady Jam Back At The House Izabella Gypsy Woman Fire Voodoo Child (slight return)/Stepping Stone Star Spangled Banner Purple Haze Woodstock Improvisation Villanova Junction Hey Joe |
| Set 2 | |
| Set 3 | |
| Comment | Complete performance at Woodstock |