Hendrix engineer-producer EDDIE KRAMER witnessed Jimi’s famed Pepper tribute.

I was upstairs at the Saville Theatre [London, June 4, 1967] , in the dressing room with Jimi, Mitch [Mitchell] and Noel [Redding]. Jimi had a little Philips record player that he was playing a copy of Sgt. Pepper on. I’m not sure if it was an advanced copy or if he’d just bought it. I just remember the disc was bigger than the actual record layer. Jimi was playing them the opening song. Noel and Mitch were huddled around him and he was running through the chords. This is literally five minutes before they went on. Then they ran downstairs and jumped on-stage and opened with Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, and if you’ve heard the tapes you’ll know it was stunning. Well, George [Harrison] and Paul [McCartney] are in the audience and their jaws fall to the floor. Paul says that George turned to him and said, “We’ve got to go back to the studio and re-do the fucking guitars!” But everyone in the business had the same response to Sgt. Pepper. It was, “Holy shit – the game has just changed.” The integration of the orchestral parts was immense. Coming from a classical background myself

I really revered George Martin’s touch. Pepper is unimaginable without George Martin. And the way it was presented as a piece of music, beautifully joined together. And the variety – the changing moods and rhythms. Being a young engineer, coming up through the ranks at Olympic, it was a revelation. And shortly after, working with The Beatles on All You Need Is Love and Baby You’re A Rich Man, was another. They were just so damned efficient. The workmanship and quality and the sonic surprises – they brought all that with them. Sgt. Pepper opened up the bloody floodgates. People weren’t afraid to take pop music seriously after that.