THE JIMI HENDRIX EXPERIENCE - ARE YOU EXPERIENCED @ 55

 

 

May 12 marks the 55th anniversary of the UK release of the debut LP by The Jimi Hendrix Experience - Are You Experienced, which was issued on this day in 1967 (the US release followed on August 23). It remains one of the most critically and commercially successful debuts by a rock artist and not only redefined the parameters and direction of psychedelic rock, but became a touchstone in the development of hard rock and heavy metal while also staking out an entirely new landscape for blues and R&B music.

 

By 1966, Jimi Hendrix was going nowhere in his career as a backup guitarist on the US R&B circuit, but that would all start to change when he caught the attention of Linda Keith, who was dating Rolling Stones guitarist, Keith Richards at the time. She saw something there and started introducing him to various managers and industry people. Eventually this lead to a meeting with Chas Chandler, who was just coming off a stint managing The Animals. Chandler brought Hendrix to the UK and London, where he set about recruiting a new backing band for him to work with, finding guitarist Noel Redding, who took on bass duties, and drummer Mitch Mitchell.

 

With a group in place, they started hitting the studios over the course of a five month period between October 23rd, 1966 and April 4, 1967. It took a total of 16 sessions to record all the material for his debut LP, which was done at three studios: De Lane Lea, CBS and Olympic. The shifts between studios were in an effort to improve sound quality as the initial sessions at De Lane Lea were not entirely satisfying to Chandler, so they moved to CBS and later Olympic, which had the best quality equipment and latest technology.

 

Because of budget constraints, most of the pre-production work was done at an apartment Chandler was sharing with Hendrix at the time. Chandler also ensured that the creative autonomy remained squarely with Hendrix, deliberately limiting the input from from Redding and Mitchell in order to avoid having to deal with the usual politics of band relations and compromises. It was Jimi’s show and that was made clear from the get-go. Besides, Hendrix had all the details of his songs worked out in his head anyway, so there was little need for additional input.

 

Recording of the album was interspersed between live gigging throughout the UK and Europe. Things were initially a little tense in the studio as the technicians struggled to record Hendrix at the screaming loud volume he insisted upon. The volume of his twin Marshall stack was so loud that it was causing audible rattling throughout the studio, which was getting picked up by the mics. When Chandler insisted on him turning the level down, Hendrix threw a tantrum and threatened to head home to the US. Chandler responded by placing his passport and travel papers on the mixing console and telling him to “piss off”. Hendrix laughed it off and said, “Okay, you called my bluff.” He then adjusted the levels (slightly) and got back to work.

 

Hendrix was far from confident as a vocalist compared to his prowess on guitar. He hated having anyone around when he did his vocals and, at Olympic Studios, had a privacy booth constructed to try to get isolated from the engineers, but this was problematic for them, particularly with the low lighting as it made it difficult to communicate with him and give him the correct cues while recording. The volume wars continued on at Olympic as well with nearby neighbors regularly complaining about the noise coming from the studio.

 

The studio also had to struggle with the distraction of fans showing up, especially the girls. Hendrix wasn’t exactly discreet and had no qualms about blabbing to fans where they’d be at any given time of day, which resulted in a lot of unwanted guests at the studio. Studio staff were tasked with keeping them at a safe distance so that work could continue, but later Chandler commented that he had worked with The Beatles, Stones and Led Zeppelin and none of them had caused such chaos with their followers. However, other than the quibbling about volume, Hendrix himself was generally easy going and not difficult to work with, it’s just that a bit of discretion from him would have been helpful for recording.

 

The songs for the album covered a wide range of genres from R&B to free jazz with each track possessing its own distinct personality. Yet they were all inseparably bound together by the strength of Hendrix’s style and personality, which ignited each like he would set fire to his guitars on stage. And his band, while kept on a short leash in terms of creative contributions, nonetheless stepped up to the task of supporting such a dynamic and distinctive guitar player. Cream may have invented the concept of the “power trio”, but The Jimi Hendrix experience took the “power” knob and added “11” to the dial.

 

The cover for the album had two variations with the UK version coming first, but proving unsatisfactory to Hendrix as he felt it looked to drab given the music it contained. He subsequently commissioned the US label to come up with something more reflective of the content. The UK version featured a muted color palette with only the album’s title on the front, oddly omitting the band’s name. For the US edition, noted graphic designer and fashion photographer Karl Ferris was recruited. His fashion background was put to use in helping to select the group’s wardrobe and he used a fish-eye lens and an infrared technique of his own invention which combined color reversal with heat signature manipulation. Upon listening to the band’s music, the designer had conceptualized the shot as a "group traveling through space in a Biosphere on their way to bring their unworldly space music to earth.”

 

Upon its release, the album was an immediate commercial success in both the UK and US and received rave critical reviews. Since then it’s gone on to become recognized as one of the most significant debut albums of all time. Hendrix’s influence on the world of rock music and the evolution of guitar playing is incalculable as he can lay claim to having an impact on everything from heavy metal to funk to industrial music. Anyone who’s picked up a guitar in the last half century and wanted to do something more with it than strum a few chords eventually has to look to Hendrix as a pioneer and inspiration. His debut LP could not be a more perfect representation of that talent.

THE ROLLING STONES - EXILE ON MAIN STREET @ 50

 

Released on the 12th of May, 1972, The Rolling Stones’ Exile On Main Street celebrates its 50th anniversary today! Considered one of the bands all time best albums, it marked a creative peak for the long running band.

The album was a bit of a hodgepodge of songs recorded over an extended period going back as early 1969 during sessions for Sticky Fingers. This resulted in it sprawling into becoming the band’s first double LP set by the time the dust settled. Much of it was recorded in mid-1971 using their mobile studio at the rented villa Nellcôte in the South of France. At the time, the band were living abroad as tax exiles, thus inspiring the album’s title and the collage graphics on its cover, which Mick Jagger described showing the band as “runaway outlaws using the blues as its weapon against the world". The sessions in France were noted as being something of a chaotic shambles with them going basically all night, every night. Unlike previous album sessions, the discipline was lacking as band members tended to show up at irregular intervals, with not everyone being present each day. Part of this had to do with Keith slipping into a daily heroine habit by this time. Bill Wyman simply didn’t like the atmosphere at the villa and sat out many of the sessions there. Yet from all that madness, the band somehow managed to stitch it all together into something that made sense once all the pieces of the puzzle were in place. Final overdubs and mixing were done in LA in March of 1972. This is where most of the vocals and guitar overdubs ended up being recorded.

Other than the regular band members, the sessions in France also featured a large rotating array of guest musicians popping in and out for sessions throughout their time there. These included the likes of pianist Nicky Hopkins, saxophonist Bobby Keys, drummer Jimmy Miller and horn player Jim Price. The resulting musical stew cooked up by all these players crossed boundaries between blues, rock and roll, swing, country and gospel, while the lyrics explored themes related to hedonism, sex and time. Many of the songs contained on the album ended up becoming concert staples for years after the album’s release. It spawned the hit songs "Happy", which featured a rare lead vocal from Keith Richards, country music ballad "Sweet Virginia", and worldwide top-ten hit "Tumbling Dice".

Upon the album’s release, while it shot to the number one chart slot in the UK, US, Canada and other countries, the critics were initially mixed in their reaction. Some found the song quality inconsistent, something to be expected given the fact it was recorded over so many years. Also, as a double disc set, it tended to meander through its palette of genres. But as time has given context to the album, it quickly took on the perspective as one of the band’s greatest achievements and, for some, the high watermark of their career.

ROXY MUSIC - AVALON @ 40

 

Released in May of 1982, the eighth and final studio album by Roxy Music, Avalon, is marking its 40th anniversary this month. As a capstone to the groups prestigious career, it would offer up perhaps the most perfect example of their sophistication and creativity, at least as far as their post Eno period is concerned. As well as being arguably the greatest artistic achievement of the latter half of their career, the album was also their most commercially successful. It perched on the number one slot in the UK for three weeks and remained in the charts for for over a year. While it only peaked at 53 on the US Billboard charts, it proved to be a “sleeper” hit and continually ramped up sales until it was eventually certified platinum, their only album to do so in the US. Its success was buoyed by the four hit singles which were released from the album.

The album continued the romantic themes common to their last few releases and Brian Ferry has said that he had wanted to interconnect the songs into a kind of narrative, though the finished product would require a bit of stretching to reach that end as Ferry admits he just didn’t have the patience to stitch it all together properly. The concept of Avalon is an Arthurian legend of the afterlife where the Queens ferry King Arthur off to an enchanted island after his death.

The title song features a guest vocal appearance from Yanick Étienne, who Ferry and Rhett Davies stumbled on while doing some last minute re-cutting on the album on a Sunday when the studio would make itself available during the quiet times to young artists to record demos. When Brian and Rhett popped out for a coffee, they heard Yanick singing in the studio next door and were immediately taken with her. She spoke no English, so her manager had to translate, but she was recruited to sing the high parts in the song, which helped to finish the song off after going through a complete rebuild when the first version proved unsatisfactory.

Roxy Music, overall, has become one of an elite number of rock groups who have had an incredibly profound influence on the generations which followed them. Groups like Japan and Duran Duran built their careers on the foundations laid by Roxy Music, both musically and stylistically in terms of their looks and attitudes. Avalon offers up the quintessential expression of their oeuvre with a set of songs that each display their own self contained perfection. There’s no filler on this record and it has retained its presence and power throughout the decades it has had to establish its status as a pop music classic.

CHRIS & COSEY - TRANCE @ 40

 

Marking its 40th anniversary this month is the second studio album from former TG founders Chris & Cosey, Trance, which was released in May of 1982.

Despite its title, “Trance” really has nothing to do with the electronic musical genre which would emerge nearly a decade later in the rave scenes of the UK and Europe. That’s not to say that the duo didn’t create music at this time which was a direct precursor to that style. The track, Dancing Ghosts, from the Elemental 7 soundtrack is indeed an ancestor and inspiration, but this album itself, while ahead of its time for electronic music, veers into other far more exotic territory.

Unlike the group’s debut, this album is nearly all instrumental with vocals only appearing on the track, Secret, and then only as atmospherics. It was designed to function as “mood” music, or a kind of bizarre “easy listening”, though Cosey’s searing guitar flailing on Re-Education Through Labor makes for some challenging meditations. Overall, it tends to exist in an odd netherworld between “ambient” and more rhythmic grooves. While the prior album, Heartbeat, occasionally brushed against "pop-song" conventions, Trance keeps clear of them, striving to remain true to it’s atmospheric ambitions and succeeding consistently throughout.

The front cover of the album offers up a portrait of the couple framed by the ancient Roman gates of London in the background. The location lends a sense of timelessness to the album and reinforces its ability to transcend temporal constraints. Indeed, as it has aged, its foresight and innovation have enabled it to continue to sound futuristic and alien, even after four decades of musical and technological advancement. There’s simply nothing about this LP that sounds dated or of its time. Most of humanity still hasn’t managed to arrive at the fantastical world which emanates from these recordings. Personally, it has always been and remains one of their most beloved releases in their canon.

CABARET VOLTAIR - 2 X 45 @ 40

 

Released in May of 1982, Cabaret Voltaire’s fourth studio album, 2x45, is marking 40 years on the shelf this month. It was the transitional album between their early experimental work and their more dance floor friendly fare which would dominate their career going forward. It also marked a downsizing of the band’s core members from a trio to a duo as Chris Watson left the group half way through its production. The first disc of the set was recorded with Chris at the group’s Sheffield Western Works studio in October of 1981 while the second disc was recorded without Watson at Pluto Studios, Manchester, in February of 1982.

The title for the album is a direct reference to its original format, being a set of two 45 RPM 12” EPs enclosed in a black textured foldout card stock sleeve with Neville Brody graphics concealed on the interior. As the album focuses on a set of long rhythmic tracks, the higher fidelity afforded by the format offered optimum sound quality for the material. Though they were decidedly moving into a funkier groove, the music beyond the beat felt more “jazz” inspired, though still thick with the group’s experimental discordance. They hadn’t quite landed in the “EBM” zone which would define their next LP, The Crackdown, but the remixed single version of Yashar by John Robie would create a direct bridge to that era. For 2x45, however, the rhythms are primarily provided by real drums and the use of electronics is surprisingly limited.

Because the album moved so far outside the “industrial” framework of its predecessor, Red Mecca, and didn’t quite arrive at their eventual EBM destination, it tends to be overlooked by both of the band’s fan camps for their early vs later output. Initial reviews for the album saw it as a lesser success than Red Mecca, but the benefit of hindsight has shown that what the group were doing was still very much outside what anyone else were up to at the time and still on the cutting edge of experimental pop. As such, it remains one of their most idiosyncratic releases.

LAIBACH - KAPITAL @ 3O

 

Celebrating 30 years since its release is the fourth studio LP by Laibach, Kapital, which was issued on April 21st, 1992. Uniquely, the album is different depending on the format, with different versions of the songs being used for the vinyl, cassette and CD variations.

Thematically, the album came about at a time when communism was reaching its end and Yugoslavia was about to enter into a particularly bloody time of conflict. As such the concepts around the album were decidedly disillusioned and dark, with a foreboding sense of industry and commerce. This is most clearly stated on the album's lead single, "Wirtschaft Ist Tot," or "Economy Is Dead”. They were just as suspicious of the new looming gods of gangster capitalism as they were of the old communist insiders.

In general, this is probably the group’s most “electronic” album, often veering into a Kraftwerk-esque sound, albeit with a somewhat more “east of the wall” feel. It still maintains an “industrial” edge, but does so with a great restraint and a decidedly funkier electronic precision. It was their longest album to date, taking advantage of the full CD runtime, and featured all original material. After their bombastic interpretation of The Beatles’ Let It Be album on their previous release, Kapital offered a tight, minimalist and club friendly vibe. With that disposition, it became very popular within the burgeoning techno landscape which had taken the underground music scenes over since the explosion of rave culture and acid house in the late 1980s. With this album, Laiback could sidle up alongside artists like Aphex Twin and Autechre and not seem out of place. They even incorporated a bit of rap into the proceedings! Ultimately, it offered up a fresh and funky approach to proletariat techno-pop for the ‘90s.

LOOSE TAPESTRIES PRESENT THE LUXURY COMEDY TAPES @ 10

April 21st marks the tenth anniversary of Loose Tapestries debut LP, The Luxury Comedy Tapes. The album was issued as a digital download on March 2nd of that year, but a small run of 500 copies on vinyl were released for Record Store Day.

Loose Tapestries was a collaboration between comedy performer Noel Fielding and Sergio Pizzorno of the band, Kasabian. They had come together to create the musical components for Noel’s UK series, Noel Fielding’s Luxury Comedy. This first release collects all the musical elements used for the first season with a second collection issued in 2016 for series two. Kasabian touring members Ben Kealey and Tim Carter also worked on the album.

Stylistically, the music and audio snipers follow along a very psychedelic progression completely consistent with the look and feel of the show, which was like an even more strung out version of Pee Wee’s Playhouse. For the album, brief musical segments are woven together with occasional spoken clips from the show to create a kind of stream of consciousness dreamlike flow. Among it’s many memorable oddities is perhaps the best original birthday song to come along in decades in the form of “Ghost of a Flea (Happy Birthday Song)”. It’s a hilariously bizarre, surreal experience from beginning to end.