Too bad cuz he opened up so many doors for Black artists who were NOT the Smokey era Temptations to experiment w/ their sounds and even their whole image. Could you imagine a Prince or even a Marley w/o a Jimi to blaze the trail?

Doubt it.

Timmy84 said:

I thought you'd appreciate that w/ your Motown fetish (which I share). Frankly, we should be big upping Jimi the way folks big up Marley. He was a real treasure cuz he opened hearts and minds to possibilities. I love the "mainstays" too, but the boundaries of acceptable were quite limited for Black artists until him. He was an eccentric and we need them too.

brooksie said:

Haha, you'd be surprised to know I'm very diverse (and yes I admit to my Motown fetish, glad you share in that ) and I definitely think we should big upped Jimi. He was so cool.

Timmy84 said:

I know you're diverse, I've read many of your posts. It's great to see such a Motown/Stax/old school fan tho. Your Motown 50 thread really put the fire back under me. I pulled out my books/tapes for a re-read/re-watch.

So did the Soul Trainers laugh at Ziggy?

brooksie said:

I have no idea. I have vague memories of Ziggy on "Soul Train", I just remembered seeing the Soul Train line. I was born after the show's heyday unfortunately.

babynoz said:

I had no idea that Bob actually got laughed off Soul Train ...I gotta look for that clip. I'm not surprised cuz tho I was very young, I recall people's reaction to reggae in general . LOL...methinks it was the hair back then. Folks were just starting to accept afros, dreads were too much!

Did that cussing sistah have a wild hair do? I need to pull out that tape again, but I think she was apart of Jimi's NYC "fam" along w/ the Allens. I forget her name, but I think she was also an ex of Sam Cooke.

If you dig BoG, have you heard that live Winterland New Year's Eve set he did? It was his last NYE, so that brings a tear..but he, Buddy and Billy tore it up.

what do you guys think Jimi Hendrix would've been able to accomplish had he stayed alive? musically I mean, I've read that Hendrix was one of the most innovative pop musicians along with the likes of the Beatles and Stevie Wonder in his era, so I'm assuming he would've definitely done something great in rock-blues, jazz fusion oro funk-rock.

Sandino said:

When he died, he was going in a mostly jazz-rock fusion to my ears, but he could have easily gone in ANY direction. LOL...Jimi could have even done some early rap and hip hop (seriously), maybe reggae, or what now might be called punk-proto punk (a la Velvets or Iggy). I think he'd have been even bigger in the 70s than the 60s.

Electric Ladyland was a state of the art studio for its time and the man was obssesed w/ experimenting in the studio. The possibilities are literally limitless to what he could have done and what directions he could have gone. Jimi could have realistically invented a new genre that we simply can't conceive of now.

brooksie said:

That's going a bit far wouldn't you say? Undoubtedly jimi was one of the most creative western pop artists of the 20th century, rivalled by a handful, but to create an entirely new genre by yourself is almost unheard of. In fact to do this it means you would need to have people not only imitate you but build upon the foundations you've set, Jimi was, as good as he was, only a guitarist and singer/songwriter. To create musical genres it's literally out of a musicians control IMO.

Timmy84 said:

Based on "Band Of Gypsies" and other odds and sods from late in his life, I thought he was going in a more jazz-rock fusion direction and not funk. Most Black folks I come across who get turned on to Hendrix cite BoG as their intro as opposed to his JHE stuff. IOW, they start at the end and work backwards. I don't thik Jimi would have gone the funk route a la Sly or anything because that was already being done. I think he was going off in a whole new direction.

I think Jimi was quite well aware of his changing the direction of the music and his part in it. When he was offered the chance, he jumped in w/ both feet. He knew fully well what was going on in both the US and UK scenes before he ever left NYC w/ Chas Chandler. He was in it to win it. Too bad he didn't live to see the bread like his more uptight counterpart EC!

I don't think Jimi would have ever had mainstream success w/ Black Americans even if he'd lived longer. Far too "bohemian" for comfort for most, methinks. Like Bob Marley (who Blackwell launched from the UK via the previous Hendrix blueprint), neither conformed to the mainstream Black tastes of that era...and even now, to tell the truth. Unlike Marley, I'm not so sure Hendrix craved acceptance from Black folks either.
[Edited 6/2/09 17:07pm]

That chick's name from the movie was Fayne Pridgon (known mostly as Faye but full name Lithofayne ). She was one of the big groupies on the chitlin circut and crossover! LOL
[Edited 6/2/09 22:36pm]

First of all, anyone who knows anything about Jimi would know that Jimi DID want acceptance from the black audience. VERY much so. And don't be naive about the fact that he didn't have a black audience. Was it on the mass level of The Temptations or any other Motown act? No. But don't be fooled into thinking that their weren't ANY blacks who weren't into Jimi. Because that is simply not the case. Jimi was a HUGE influence on many funk black bands that came after Jimi. He not only influenced them musically but he influenced them visually as well. Jimi totally opened up their minds and showed them what was possible musically. Simply put, Jimi freed up their minds. He gave them courage to be different, to wave their Freak Flag high. Funkadelic, The Isley Brothers, The Bar Kays, The Ohio Players, Bootsy Collins just to name a few. Even early E,W & F and their style of dress simply would not have existed if it weren't for Jimi. Jimi influenced black musicians to push the envelope musically. The arrival of the obligatory rock guitar solo in funk was brought about soley because of Hendrix. He influenced cats like Miles and Stanley Clarke. His impact was huge on black music in the 70's. You had the wah wah in EVERYTHING. That was all because of Hendrix. From Issac's Shaft to Curtis's SuperFly to Barry's Love Theme and on and on. Jimi's impact on black music in the 70's is far and wide. You're not going to have any of this written about in the history books but it still remains true. Oh yes my brother, blacks showed their love and their ACCEPTANCE for Hendrix in the things that they themselves did in their OWN music.
[Edited 6/3/09 0:43am]
[Edited 6/3/09 0:49am]

brooksie said:

That same site has a kathy interview.

Jimi used to lock his gf in rooms and beat them.

brooksie said:

First of all, anyone who knows anything about Jimi would know that Jimi DID want acceptance from the black audience. VERY much so. And don't be naive about the fact that he didn't have a black audience. Was it on the mass level of The Temptations or any other Motown act? No. But don't be fooled into thinking that their weren't ANY blacks who weren't into Jimi. Because that is simply not the case. Jimi was a HUGE influence on many funk black bands that came after Jimi. He not only influenced them musically but he influenced them visually as well. Jimi totally opened up their minds and showed them what was possible musically. Simply put, Jimi freed up their minds. He gave them courage to be different, to wave their Freak Flag high. Funkadelic, The Isley Brothers, The Bar Kays, The Ohio Players, Bootsy Collins just to name a few. Even early E,W & F and their style of dress simply would not have existed if it weren't for Jimi. Jimi influenced black musicians to push the envelope musically. The arrival of the obligatory rock guitar solo in funk was brought about soley because of Hendrix. He influenced cats like Miles and Stanley Clarke. His impact was huge on black music in the 70's. You had the wah wah in EVERYTHING. That was all because of Hendrix. From Issac's Shaft to Curtis's SuperFly to Barry's Love Theme and on and on. Jimi's impact on black music in the 70's is far and wide. You're not going to have any of this written about in the history books but it still remains true. Oh yes my brother, blacks showed their love and their ACCEPTANCE for Hendrix in the things that they themselves did in their OWN music.
[Edited 6/3/09 0:43am]
[Edited 6/3/09 0:49am]

That chick's name from the movie was Fayne Pridgon (known mostly as Faye but full name Lithofayne ). She was one of the big groupies on the chitlin circut and crossover! LOL
[Edited 6/2/09 22:36pm]

Just the other day I was listening to "Exodus" and was thinking it would have made a killer Soul Train line song. The groove on that cut is dangerous!

babynoz I only have a double cd from that Winterland show. Here's a non Amazon but detailed review of this set: http://www.soul-patrol.co...ilmore.htm . I'm not sure there's a dvd/vhs of it, but I've not seen it. For me, it was his voice that was the acquired taste. I loved his intimate quality of singing as I got a bit older. That chick's name totally eludes me, but we're talking about the same person. I always found it interestokng that Jimi had two lives post 66...his NYC (mostly Black) and London (mostly White). That must have been a real trip back then.

Timmy I've been thinking about what you said wrt funk. If Jimi hadn't gone off to England in 66, I think he could have gone that way. He'd played behind most of the major players on the chitlin circut and had even won the Apollo, so he surely could have gone that way. I do wonder how Jimi would have gone if the UK opportunity hadn't come. He was totally primed for Black audiences of that era, musically at least.

Soul Train was KILLER in the 70s-early 80s. LOL the show's goodness shrank as Don's 'fro did.
[Edited 6/2/09 22:46pm]
[Edited 6/2/09 23:20pm]

blackguitaristz said:

My own folks listened to Jimi as I stated, so obviously there was SOME Black audience. I never said there wasn't a Black audience, just that it wasn't huge. There's always some who are open to everything, so it would be nuts to say otherwise. BTW...I'm a sistah, BTW.

Did you check the Allen Twins link I posted? They were there and why should they make it up?

Obviously Jimi influnced some Black people and still does, however I think it's clear that he didn't have mass acceptance from of Black folks as opposed to Black musicians. Big diff. The people you cited are musicians, not everyday listeners. Wah wah was used extensively in the late 60s, so we can't fully attribute that to HIM even tho he was the 1st HEARD using it. (The 1st, as you know was actually EC, but Experienced was released before Disreli) Plenty of Black musicians listened to and were/are influenced by Marley too (see Stevie Wonder, Lenny Kravitz, etc), but that doesn't mean the masses accepted the original artists outright. Why listen to the watered down versions when you can listen to the real thing?

I will clarify and say that I don't think he wanted mass Black acceptance IF that meant he had to water down what he was doing and his image to get it. Much of Jimi and Marley's problem w/ the Black mainstream back then was image related, perhaps more so than music related...think he didn't know that? Even when he was playing the Chitlin Circuit, he got drama about this (see Bobby Womack's book among others). In short, I think he would have been fine attracting Blacks and fine not attracting them in terms of mass appeal.
[Edited 6/3/09 10:05am]

blackguitaristz said:

One of the best posts on Jimi I've ever seen here. Right on the money.
[Edited 6/3/09 10:29am]