#170 – Purple Haze by Jimi Hendrix Experience
Jimi Hendrix Experience
– Like chewing aluminum foil. I’ll let that roll around in your mind for a moment…
This might be difficult for younger classic rockers to grasp, but Jimi Hendrix wasn’t an instant, overnight success. His earliest records released in England during 1967 were not exactly hits, even though other rock musicians were taking notice. On May 29th he opened a concert in London with the song Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. The Beatles were in attendance and more than impressed since the LP had been released only three days earlier. That moment has been written and talked about countless times since because Hendrix is such a legend.
But at that time in 1967 he wasn’t… yet.
On June 3rd Sgt. Pepper was released in the U.S. and organizers for the Monterey Pop Festival starting two weeks later were doing their best to coax The Beatles into performing. They turned it down, but Paul McCartney suggested Jimi Hendrix. They went for it and that’s when the legend started becoming real.
At least for the people that were there.
Let me stand next to your fire!
For many younger teenagers living near the northern Ohio metropolis of Cleveland, now home to The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, we didn’t hear much (if anything at all) about this legendary rock ‘n’ roll event. This was before Rolling Stone Magazine started covering the hippie scene for those of us thousands of miles away and the film Monterey Pop with Jimi’s legend-making guitar burning performance didn’t even come out until December 1968. I’m pretty sure I didn’t see it until it made my university’s late night film lineup during the 1970’s.
Hendrix’s album Are You Experienced with Purple Haze was released in late August 1967. And since none of the songs were played on our reliable Top 40 AM “pop” radio stations, we pretty much had no idea who Jimi Hendrix was.
But during that same Summer Of Love, riots in Detroit forced my grandmother to get the heck out of Dodge. With army snipers on the roof of her apartment building near the Detroit River, she caught a Greyhound Bus and made it to our isolated niche on the shores of Lake Erie. When the fires simmered down we drove through the battle zone, packed up her stuff and moved her into an apartment near us.
It was around this time I started hearing rumors about underground music on FM radio stations.
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Since grandmothers are usually programmed never to say “No” to their favorite grandchildren, she allowed me to commandeer her FM stereo radio. Not long before this, FM was pretty much a wasteland for teenage pop music fans by featuring talk, easy listening music, weather and news. The older generations might have tuned in, but boomers were only within hearing range when we were stuck in a doctor’s or dentist’s waiting room playing FM stations that numbed us to near-death with background elevator muzak.
Through grandma’s radio I listened to songs by groups that were leading us from pop to rock. This included the Jimi Hendrix Experience and the songs Purple Haze, Fire and Foxy Lady. It was called psychedelic and sounded electric, heavy, soulful and very cool.
I was hooked.
In early winter 1968 mom and dad took my sister and me to New York City to visit our Radio City Rockette cousin. Thanks to a lake effect snowstorm that shut down the Cleveland airport, we boarded a passenger train for a twelve hour ride to Grand Central Station. Somewhere near Rockefeller Center between watching shows by the high kicking Rockettes, I wandered into a record store and saw Are You Experienced.
I bought it.
After an all night train ride home spending as much time looking at the LP cover as I did looking out the window, I finally had the chance to rip off the plastic wrapping and put it on the turntable of our family stereo. This might also be difficult for younger classic rockers to grasp, but a stereo in many boomer’s homes during the 1950’s and 60’s doubled as a piece of furniture. So I was a bit surprised when my parents allowed me to commandeer the stereo and move it into my bedroom for my own personal use. They didn’t mind rock ‘n’ roll (after all, they had taken me to see The Beatles), but this gave them a better chance to hear what was on their FM stations when I listened to Jimi’s guitar feedback behind my closed bedroom door.
But similar to discovering Jimi Hendrix at the age of fourteen, I realized my room wasn’t cool enough for this new music. Hendrix also had a look and my room had none.
Sometime that summer I found a psychedelic poster of Jimi Hendrix with the words, “Like chewing aluminum foil.” My first impression was that it was funny. But it was also different and seemed very cool.
I bought it.
But it needed a better display than just being hung up in my room, so I also bought a blue light bulb. Don’t misunderstand. This was not a blue light that could be paired up with a lava lamp to turn any kid’s bedroom into a hippie hang out. It was exactly what I said it was – a blue light bulb. I slid open my closet door, pushed the clothes on hangers as far to the side as possible, tacked up my Jimi Hendrix poster and replaced the regular light bulb (with a pull string to turn it on) with the blue bulb.
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I had a cool room.
When my pals came over I would open the closet door, push aside the clothes, pull on the blue light bulb string, and play Are You Experienced. Oh yeah… we thought we were very cool.
Purple Haze joined this Dream Song list on September 2nd. I still own my original vinyl album, but in the years since have added it to my digital playlist. And since I had just heard it, the song joins the recent memory list.
Like chewing aluminum foil? Yeah, since we weren’t really that cool you should know what’s coming…
During this phase of our high school careers, my best pal Kevin and I were pretty much inseparable. We were about fourteen or fifteen years old and if I wasn’t at his house he was at mine. We’d ride our bikes around town looking for great adventures and throw parties so we could talk-up the cute girls in our class. On weekends we’d sleep over at one of our houses so we could stay up all night watching the dumbest movies we could find on television.
Actually, we were pretty bright kids and really didn’t get into any trouble. But then again, even smart kids can be dumber than the dumbest…
One night with my Jimi Hendrix poster displayed in it’s (not that cool) blue light, we started debating what like chewing aluminum foil really meant. Was Hendrix trying to tell us something? Was it about the music or the experience?
There was only one way to find out.
We walked into the kitchen, took out two pieces of aluminum foil, popped them into our mouths and bit down. Maybe it had to do with having one or two metal tooth fillings that were popular with muzak-listening dentists in the 1960’s, but there is only one way to describe the sensation.
OUCH!!!!!
If you’ve ever made the claim that you’ll try anything once in your life – cross this one off your list. It was like having a jolt of Jimi Hendrix electric guitar feedback screaming through every nerve ending connecting our jaws to our brains. We couldn’t spit it out fast enough while trying to muffle our cries of agony so we wouldn’t wake up my mom and dad. It was bad enough to learn how dumb we could be without letting my parents in on the realization.
Decades later I can still dredge up the pain like a bad acid flashback – even though I’ve never taken acid. If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like to stick a live electric wire your mouth, it’s…
Like chewing aluminum foil.
To this day if Kevin and I see each other all we have to say is, “LCAF.” Believe me, the impression was lasting and we both know exactly what we’re referring to.
The legend-making part of Jimi Hendrix’s career was also a short explosion that only lasted only a few years. He died in September 1970 while I was still in high school and at a time when some rock stars were only just starting to figure out there might be a dark side to doing drugs – and teenagers learned not to chew aluminum foil.
But we didn’t stop playing his records. Like The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and a certain few other legends of the rock world, Hendrix still seems to be relevant. He is still referred to as one of the best – if not THE best – rock guitar player and innovator. He changed the music forever.
He also changed the way I look at aluminum foil. LCAF.
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For a live performance video of Purple Haze by the Jimi Hendrix Experience, check this out…
To purchase Are You Experienced with Purple Haze visit Amazon.com
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Dave Schwensen is The Classic Rocker and author of The Beatles At Shea Stadium and The Beatles In Cleveland. Visit Dave’s author page on Amazon.com.
Copyright 2018 – North Shore Publishing
– It doesn’t matter what generation you fit into on the pop culture chart, even if you’ve reached the status of “Can’t teach an old dog new tricks.” The end of summer means one thing:
Using these historical grooved references tucked in designer cardboard sleeves as inspiration and to pay respect to Hollywood’s favorite college freshman, Rodney Dangerfield, here are my selections for the top three Back To School Classic Rock Songs. But keep in mind these are more than just songs about the topic. That’s not the main point. I’m going for the feeling, attitude and just flat-out fun that were important memory-makers prior to our admittance into the real world.
What’s a list about songs connected with summer that doesn’t have at least one connected to The Beach Boys? Except this choice has nothing to do with daddy’s T-Bird, surfin’ girls, California girls, or even staying true to your school. It’s all about the attitude of America’s college students in the early 1970’s from a group of college dropouts later revered as America’s Band.
Oh man… This one is just wrong. At least that’s what the Parents Music Resource Center said when they tried to have the song and (especially) the video pulled from the airwaves in 1984. But when it comes to combining feelings of your nerve-wracking first day of school with a crush on your teacher, this one brings back both.
Hey, cut me a break. Don’t you think I know the original Shout was by The Isley Brothers in 1959? And there was also a shortened version by The Beatles from their 1964 television special, Around The Beatles, and included on Anthology Vol. 1. But when it comes to pure back to school fun, National Lampoon’s Animal House put Otis Day & The Knights on The Campus Wall of Fame.
– Being a Classic Rocker is not always an exact science. Especially when the archeological dig through our minds lack video or photographic evidence from the world of pop and rock, which was once considered disposable.
– Okay, I know 10cc is a band from England. Since I just had to look up that last gem of knowledge online, I also know sometimes there were four guys in the band and sometimes there were only two. One of them (Eric Stewart) was an original member of Wayne Fontana and The Mindbenders and scored a number one hit in 1965 with Game Of Love. After Wayne split the scene, his backing group released their own hit Groovy Kind Of Love in 1966.
– I find celebrity sightings to be more credible in major cities than I do in… well, say my backyard. I could tell you I partied with The Rolling Stones last night, but it only means I sipped a light beer while listening to Honky Tonk Women. I doubt anyone would believe Mick or Keith – or even Mick Taylor – would have wandered by and accepted my invitation for a cocktail.
– If you were a Boomer in 1982 and involved in any type of romantic relationship, it’s almost impossible to separate this song from the movie An Officer and a Gentleman. The grand finale when Richard Gere walks into the factory wearing his Navy whites and sweeps Debra Winger off her feet is still a highlight in the drama/romance genre and the movie soundtrack played an instrumental version of this song as it was all coming down.
