Jimi Hendrix: Purple Box Disc-by-Disc

Thanks for your comments! Clearly no consensus here.

 

Perhaps not, but we seem to have reached a consensus on the whole "Wolf" vs. "Wet" controversy.

 

Very important that.

 

After a fast review of Disc 2 other than my faves of "Axis's & "Wing" for their display of "top of the head" heart felt licks. The star here for me is the Live performance of "Midnight Lamp" Jimi floors me with his stunning vocal and the guitar playing for licks and tone. This tops the recorded version for me. IMO Jimi's was a great vocal stylist. His singing conveyed his personality so well.

 

While I think the definitive version will always be the one on Electric Ladyland, I have a soft spot for any performance of this song. It seems odd to use the word "dainty" when describing a Jimi Hendrix performance, but the approach on this live version feels tentative, as though the band were making an extra effort to nail every part perfectly. The resulting self-consciousness makes the performance come off a bit stiff, but I find it very endearing all the same.

 

Chris, what is the NEXT line?????
This has stumped me for over 25 years!

 

before "Catfish Blues," when Jimi is rappin to the audience about the blues, does he briefly say "Gimme an A"?

 

Just out of sheer curiosity, what's wrong with his sig line?

 

And that to me, one of the few people on this forum, who could not care less about exotic and hard to find first generation Japanese CDs from x-th generation master tapes and still loves to listen to "(What's The Story) Morning Glory". Really.

I should add that I do not expect pristine sound from a box of outtakes and live recordings, which come from a variety of sources.

The smiley moves and implies laughter and as I like to laugh, it always gets me to read that quote again, which was kinda funny, when I first read it, but got old the next day.

 

You nailed it Tom. The alternate Bold as Love might be my favorite Jimi performance of all. Right up there with the Woodstock Star Spangled Banner Woodstock and the BOG Machine Gun.

As you mention there are a few missed notes and a stumbly fill or two but the best moments here provide some of the most life affirming rock music I've heard. What Jimi plays just before the 4 minute mark slays me. Somehow it is simultaneously unbearably joyful but also full of loss. At his best Jimi makes you feel everything at once. If I'm out of a run and I hit a wall I know that the Purple Box Bold as Love will put me right back in the mix.

I love how the band probably knew this wasn't going to be THE take for the album but they kept going and played their a**es off. There are lots of alternate Bold as Love takes still in the vault

 

I never picked up on that before but you are spot on about the Allman Brothers feel in some of the passages on Sweet Angel. Amazing that Jimi had Angel as early as the Axis sessions but didn't record it in the studio until almost 3 years later.

 

This is just an all around wonderful box set. They could actually put another one out right away with what is out there that would be just as good. I've e-mailed Dagger praising them for the set and suggesting they do another box or please release more studio Jimi. If everyone enjoys this box maybe they could do the same?

I would urge anyone not to let sound quality concerns get in the way of this music. It sounds great. Does the Little Wing gives me goose bumps like my Hendrix In The West Album did? No. Have I ever let that get in the way of enjoying this set, no. Maybe support Dagger records and buy their releases. From this box you can tell if live or studio Jimi is of the most interest to you. They have both live and studio releases that are fantastic. The sound on the studio releases are fantastic. Some of the live cd's aren't audiophile spectaculars. They are sonic spectaculars because they have Jimi live, creating music on stage.

I would actually love to have a studio box and a live box release. I think they would flow better but that's me. It should also have a BluRay version but that's me also. No box, one BluRay.

 

One can never have too many versions of 'Little Wing'. Besides, the In the West 'Little Wing' is on disc 3, no?

Which is a nice segue into ...

 

Disc three (Please feel free to discuss selections from discs 1-3.)

1. "Stone Free" (Hendrix) – 3:43
2. "Spanish Castle Magic" (Hendrix) – 5:50
3. "Hear My Train a Comin’" (Hendrix) – 6:58
4. "Room Full of Mirrors" (Hendrix) – 7:56
5. "I Don’t Live Today" (Hendrix) – 6:33
6. "Little Wing" (Hendrix) – 3:16
7. "Red House" (Hendrix) – 13:07
8. "Purple Haze" (Hendrix) – 4:03
9. "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)" (Hendrix) – 7:53
10. "Izabella" (Hendrix) – 3:40

* Tracks 1, 2, 3, 4 and 10 are previously unreleased alternate recordings.
* Track 5 recorded live at Los Angeles Forum, CA, April 26 1969.
* Tracks 6 and 9 recorded live at the Royal Albert Hall, London, February 24 1969.
* Tracks 7 and 8 recorded live at San Diego Sports Arena, CA, May 24 1969.

 

I might be one of the only members here that ever recorded with Hendrix and been lucky enough to have my track included on the box set....here is the story from an interview I did with Experience Hendrix Magazine..40 years ago this year....

http://www.jimihendrix.com/encyclopedia/document,19690421,1.html

 

Awesome... thanks for sharing!

 

Great! You are uncredited on the box, right? At least on mine. Probably they could not find out who you guys were.

What happened afterwards? Did you ever see him again? And what happened to your own band?

It probably was not funny back then, but I had to laugh, reading these two paragraphs:

"We recorded "Room Full Of Mirrors" and it took forever because Rocky couldn't keep the beat on drums. Midway through the session, Jimi turned to him and said something to the effect of, 'Man, do you know how to play drums? What's going on?' I had been banging one of the maracas against my leg for three and a half hours and my leg was black and blue. I told Rocky quietly that he better get things right because I couldn't walk! I had a knot on my leg that seemed four inches big. I was afraid that we were going to screw up the chance of a lifetime.

At one point in the session, the photographer [Willis Hogans Jr.] got underfoot of Jimi. He had been laying on the ground taking pictures of Jimi and he got in the way. Jimi kicked the camera out of his hands, saying to get out of the way [Ed. These may be the few color shots Hogans took of Jimi from that angle]. We thought he was joking at first but he was actually really pissed. His kick broke the camera and the photographer started crying. Jimi gave him money to get it fixed but that was the end of photos that night."

 

Respect!

Any memories or recollections we would love to hear, if you can remember of course

 

I have (and love) the CD version of this box. Is the LP a major sonic improvement?

 

Probably the weakest disc, IMO. Almost all live (not like that's a bad thing). The "limbo" period of post-'Electric Ladyland'/pre-'First Rays...'.

The "updated" studio version of "Stone Free" is cool (but the original still beats it IMO). Wasn't very impressed by the "updated" take on "Spanish Castle Magic". Good choice of live versions, but I think most of these were already around to varying degrees...

 

Yes we are uncredited on the box..That was the reason for the interview by Jon McDermott....I had just gone to work for MCA Records and when I heard the advance of the box set I recognized the session.I contacted Jon McDermott, told him the story, he verified all the info and contacted me back to write the story..We had been trying to get poeple for years to believe us that we actually did this session...It was too late to repress all the booklet inserts so McDermott did the interview and put it in the Experience Hendrix magazine...The full interview also includes the rest of the story which was that he gave us money to come back 2 days later and record more tracks with him....I ran into him at Woodstock backstage and asked if he remembered doing the session with us and he said no....I was crushed( LOL) I thought my percussion playing would last in music history.....I got to actually park his silver automatic Corvette which had a cassette player in it with tons of cassettes of him jamming with various people like Carlos Santana, Stevie Wonder,Clapton...They were just lying on his car seat......Boy if I didn't have morals or wasn't so starstruck I could have really had a treasure trove of music....But that would have been bad karma....

 

A great disc of mostly previously available material. It was nice to have all of this in such high sound quality. Just makes me long for the complete shows in similar sound quality....

 

It's strange that "Crash Landing", played at those sessions, is still unreleased in its original form. The lyrics are even quoted in Janie's book!

 

They recorded a lot of material of the 2 sessions with (forum member!) Al Marks' band. The recent updated Sessions book (titled Ultimate Experience) has the play by play of those sessions with detailed descriptions of the material. Here is a list of tracks they ran through..

April 21

Room Full Of Mirrors (lots of takes, final take on Purple box)

April 24

Bleeding Heart
Hey Country Boy (early version of Hey Baby)
Message to Love
Drone Blues (Nine To the Universe and unedited on Hear My Music)
Crash Landing (I guess this is the basis of the Douglas creation on the LP of the same name)
Bleeding Heart (second version)
Night Messenger

 

Still trying to pick my jaw up off the floor after reading this: