More than 3,000 youngsters attended two houses at the
Coventry Theatre. He can play guitar with his teeth, lying
on the stage, or behind his back – and do it better than
most in a more conventional position. The result was
a stunning, completely individual performance, which
included hits like Hey Joe, The Wind Cries Mary and
Purple Haze, and the wildest version yet of Wild Thing.
But the teenagers who stood on their seats for Jimi Hendrix
were unmoved – and I guess somewhat bewildered – by the
Pink Floyd, a group for whom the new wave is more of
a spring tide.
Coventry Evening Telegraph, November 20 ,1967an you even fucking begin to imagine,
man?
After Monterey: after San Francisco
and LA. After Peter Tork’s major hang
in Laurel Canyon: after Steve Stills’s
mansion pad in Malibu. After magical Devon and
Houdini’s far-out freak zone, man, tripping on the
Owsley seven-day weekend and the Burning Of The
Midnight Lamp flame-on. After the fucking Monkees,
man, are you fucking kidding? After
killing on the East Coast, after take-
after-take-after-take-after-take-after-
take back in the studio, with Chas
breathing heavy down my neck, man,
and that little bitch Noel pulling his
faces and drinking his shitty brown
beer, man, after all the hassles and
bullshit and money I’m making you,
man. After Axis and Paris and
Amsterdam and the Albert Hall and
all the TV and the radio, after the
Melody Maker award for ‘World Top
Musician’, big reception at the Europa
in London in September, stepping
over believers everywhere I go, man.
After all of that, you want me to go
to Coventry? Do they even know
what year it is, man? Coventry?
“That’s right,” said Mike. “It’s all
arranged.”
Another goddamned package tour?
“That’s right,” said Mike. “Only this
time you’re the headliner. Forty
minutes a night, two shows a night,
a thousand pounds guaranteed. You
can do it in your sleep.”
Jimi in a time loop, a tailspin, alltapped out: everything he’d done in the year since
he hit London. Everywhere he’d been, everything
he’d seen. Everybody that now knew his name, his
face, the whole crazy voodoo trip, man. And he’s
going out on another package tour? Wait – is
Engelbert on the fucking bill again too?
“No,” said Mike, the air thick with the fug of
cigarettes and joints. Pink Floyd, The Move, The
Nice, Amen Corner... all very cool. Easy-peasy:
money for old rope – and good cost-free promo
ahead of the release of the new album.
Jimi going home to Kathy, drinking whisky and
cola, smoking Rocky Marciano and Marlboro reds,
dropping three or four trips at a time, the way you
did when you tripped every day, one more than
yesterday every day until you finally stopped – if
you finally stopped. Jimi didn’t like to stop.
Swallowing leapers to help maintain. What if the
aliens came down now to finally say hi when
you’re out cold? Think about that, man. How
bummed you’d be. Best to just keep on keeping on,
ride on, ride on.Three weeks, twenty-nine shows – a cheap-
thrills hits package. The Move had had three, Jimi
four, including Burning Of The Midnight Lamp, which
only just squeaked into the Top 20, Jimi bent out of
shape over it but never letting on cos it’s all cool, it
ain’t just about having hits, you know? Pink Floyd
had just one, Amen Corner had one and a half.
Jimi digging the scene for what it is, going out
and doing his party favours, crotch-thrusting,
tongue-waggling, playing with his teeth, behind his
back, lying writhing on the floor. Those forty
minutes fly by, Jimi tripping throughout the entire
three weeks.
Jimi had picked up a new English roadie for the
tour, a young guitarist named Ian Kilmister who
had known a little success of his own in a northern
ballroom party band called the Rockin’ Vicars. Ian- later better known as Lemmy, after his habit of
always asking people to “lend me” a quid – was
destined to become a force of super-nature in his
own psychedelic pioneers Hawkwind (then later
punk-metal game-manglers Motörhead). Just
twenty-one, he had hitchhiked to
London and managed to blag a room at
Neville Chesters’s squat in Kensington.
Ian had met Neville when he was
working for The Who, “trying to put
guitars back together after Townshend
had finished smashing them”.
Ian had phoned Nev from a red call
box asked him if he could kip on his
floor a couple nights and Nev had
said, yes, come on over.
Ian didn’t know till he got there but
Nev was now working for Jimi and
shared the fl at with Noel. The place
full of guitars “in different degrees of
destruction that Neville was trying to
put back together out of the bits –
cannibalising Rickenbackers”.
Ian lit a cigarette, blew smoke in my
face and continued. It was thirty years
later and by now he was Lemmy.
Seeing Hendrix play for the first time
was the big turning point, he said.
“I couldn’t believe him. Nobody could
believe him. Nobody knew you could
do that with a guitar. The big thing
before that was Clapton. That was as
MA high as you could get. Hendrix used
IN:^
AVA
LON
;^ IN
SET
:^ GE
TTY
“Forty minutes a night, two shows
a night, a thousand pounds guaranteed.
You can do it in
your sleep.”
Abandoning the traditional rock-bio format, Mick Wall’s new book
is a psychedelic exploration of the life and death of Jimi Hendrix.
In this exclusive extract we find Jimi at the peak of his powers.
Words: Mick WallThe Jimi Hendrix Experience
at the Top Of The Pops
studios, January ’67:
(l-r) Mitch Mitchell, Noel
Redding, Jimi Hendrix.CLASSICROCKMAGAZINE.COM 69