JIMI HENDRIX - 1970 LIVE IN MAUI .
The full story behind what might be the strangest chapter of Jimi Hendrix’s all-too-brief career is about to come to light when Sony Legacy/Experience Hendrix releases the documentary film “Music, Money, Madness…Jimi Hendrix in Maui” on November 20, accompanied by the album “Live in Maui,” released on two CDs and three LPs. The doc traces the origins of Hendrix’s involvement in a counterculture movie shot on the Hawaiian island, and the surprise concert he was coaxed into performing there on the side of a volcano as an attempt to rescue the ill-fated film.
As we hear in the two sets of music performed in Maui, Hendrix is relaxed, loose and having fun with his band. The elements were working against them and certainly played a role in mucking up the filming and recording of the show, but Hendrix doesn’t seem to care, as he and the band let it rip on a set of mostly classic songs followed by a break, then a set of mostly new material he’d been trying to nail down with Billy Cox, Mitch Mitchell and Eddie Kramer back at Electric Lady.
Jimi seems to be in a great mood, and we see him laughing and joking with the band and with the audience. Contrast this footage to the film shot on the Isle of Wight in the UK a month later when a visually exhausted and frustrated Hendrix performed in the middle of the night while battling equipment issues in front of more than 600,000 people, many of whom stormed the gates for entry. At Maui, the pressure is off – and it shows.
Guitar nerds will want to know that Jimi plays a Fender Stratocaster, per usual, in the first set but busts out a Gibson Flying V guitar for the newer songs in set two, which gave his tonal palate a sharper, edgier, gnarlier tone on the fresh material.
It’s astonishing to see this footage look so spectacular on the Blu-ray disc, both in the 90-minute documentary “Music, Money, Madness” and in the special features, where we see every piece of 16mm film shot during Hendrix’s performance. That isn’t to say the whole show is here, because it isn’t. For a number of reasons, the crew didn’t shoot everything, but what is here is unlike any other Hendrix concert footage available.
Cameramen are onstage with the band, and even in Jimi’s face, when he goes down on his knees, head back, guitar outstretched, in an iconic shot. He accepted that this hastily arranged show was out of his hands so he decided to good-naturedly play along and give the people what they want, and it is a joy to see and hear.
Both sets were shot in daylight which afforded awesome visuals of the stage action as well as the trippy weirdness taking place out in the crowd of about 200-300 mostly awed locals.
MIKE DOW.
TOO OLD
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