Eddie Kramer “Jimi connected with the blues in a deeply emotional way”
Where do you think these recordings stand in the shift between the experience and the Band Of Gypsys? I see this album as documenting a transitional period for Jimi, in between the Experience and the Band Of Gypsys, so Mitch, Billy and Buddy are all involved on various tracks. It’s a lineup that is in constant flux between 1968 and 1970. The big clue Jimi gave was at Woodstock, when he announced the band and described them as “we’re nothing but a band of gypsies, man”. And, with Billy and Buddy, he was exploring more R&B and funk, as well as jazz and rock. What lineup do you prefer – the experience or the Gypsys? Oh man, that’s an impossible question to answer! They’re both brilliant in their own way. The key difference is between the two drummers, Mitch Mitchell and Buddy Miles. Buddy was a rock-solid funk drummer. He was unstoppable: the emphasis was on steady grooves that dug deep. Mitch was very much a jazz drummer and a huge Elvin Jones fan – even at the age of 15 he was playing with jazz orchestras and stuff. Jimi adored Mitch. He was the only drummer who could really keep up with his flights of fancy. Buddy Miles just kept the beat, but Mitch was painting with colours, improvising around the beat, moving in an improvisatory direction that mirrored Jimi’s explorations. He was very much the third voice in that group, not just a timekeeper. A lot of biographers have talked about the racial context – about Hendrix wanting to surround himself with African-American musicians. How true do you think this is? I’m not really sure about that. I mean, he was aware of what was going on in America at the time, and I’m sure you can trawl through the history books to find comments that Jimi made to journalists about racial politics at the time. But, as far as I could see, the music was dictating these lineups. Buddy and Billy made things funky, and for a while, that was very much the direction Jimi wanted to explore around 1969. He couldn’t deny that area of himself. And Buddy Miles, in particular, was very much part of that search. But, as far as I could see, Jimi was always guided by aesthetics rather than colour.
Noel Redding was obviously displeased at his treatment – did this occur with any other musicians when he stopped working with them?
I really don’t think so. He wasn’t like that at all. He was a very generous man – generous with his time, generous as a musician and as an accompanist. Even on this album, there are guys like Lonnie Youngblood and Johnny Winter. There were no hard feelings.
Judging from these tracks, it seems clear that Hendrix was reimmersing himself in the blues throughout 1969…
Yes, that’s very much a linking thing here. That was part of his heritage, a key part of what he relied on. He connected with the blues in a deeply emotional way. I think it was what he needed as his release. There’s a real catharsis in these tracks.
Were you present when any of these were recorded?
Only one or two tracks. Until this point, I was in
the studio for nearly everything Jimi recorded – for Are You Experienced,
Axis: Bold As Love, and most of Electric Ladyland. However, after the completion of Electric Ladyland, I was heavily involved in the building and creation of Electric Lady studios, so I didn’t have any time to spend with Jimi. He was down on the other side of New York at the Record Plant or the Rhythm Factory.
There are several tracks I’ve heard before in different guises, but some that have never surfaced before…
Ten out of these 13 tracks have never been released. I spent a year researching the archive with John McDermott. One of the key achievements is the mixing. It’s amazing to hear all these in-your-face recordings he made, in one place. We wanted to mix it down to sound more contemporaneous.
What do you think of Hendrix’s basslines?
Again, he always played exactly what was needed. On this album, there’s one track where he just plays octaves, but listen to his basslines on, say, “All Along The Watchtower” – they’re incredibly complicated.
How did the hook-up with Stephen Stills come about?
He was one of Jimi’s many friends in the music biz, people with whom he enjoyed hanging out and playing with. There were a lot of them, Brian Jones, Dave Mason, Jack Casady – Jimi would hang out and jam with all of them over the years. Then, in New York, he’d jam with guys he’d met at the Scene Club. He liked to jam; he loved riffing, seeing how songs changed throughout the jamming process. You’ve got to remember that he always used the studio as a recording studio, a rehearsal room and a songwriting booth, all at once.
He’s almost like a backroom guy on some of these tracks…
Exactly. Especially on the version of Joni’s “Woodstock”, with Stephen Stills. Jimi doesn’t play like some big superstar. He sublimates his ego and plays like the session musician that he was a few years earlier. On the tracks with Stephen Stills, Lonnie Youngblood and Johnny Winter, it’s like he’s the New York session musician of 1964-65, playing on the chitlin circuit with Billy Cox, doing his job brilliantly, not showing off at all.
Is there any more stuff in the can?
Well, there are a hell of a lot of live recordings that we will be going through soon! But this is pretty much the end of the trilogy of studio recordings that started with Valleys Of Neptune.
What about the Black Gold concept album?
Black Gold? Never heard of it. Ha ha!
“Jimi was a generous man - generous with his time, and as a musician…” eddIe kRAmeR