Radio One

The changes Jimi Hendrix wrought on rock & roll and its primary instrument, the electric guitar, were so cataclysmic that it is hard to imagine what it was like to be there as they happened. When Hendrix torched his Strat at Monterey in June 1967, his futuristic vision of the blues was already at a highly advanced stage. But the six months on either side of Monterey were periods of accelerated evolution for Hendrix, too profound to be digested fully amid the chaos of instant fame and too rapid to be captured in full on either Are You Experienced? or its immediate successor, Axis: Bold As Love.

Thus Radio One is a godsend. It is a compilation of seventeen “live” studio workouts by the original Experience (with Noel Redding on bass and Mitch Mitchell on drums). These previously unissued blasts of prime Hendrixiana were originally taped between February and December of 1967 for broadcast by BBC Radio in England. You can ride shotgun with Hendrix as he rockets into inner space with “Stone Free,” roughs up the Beatles’ “Day Tripper” with acid-gangster guitar and wades into the primordial blues ooze of “Hoochie Koochie Man.” Experienced and Axis were definitive statements of intention and accomplishment, Monterey the formal announcement of his arrival. But Radio One is essential Hendrix because it reveals the development of his art at its earliest and, in some ways, most crucial junctures.

“Love or Confusion,” “Fire” and “Foxy Lady” are worth the price of admission alone. These versions document with graphic force and zero studio garnish the turmoil and passion that fueled Hendrix’s technique.