Track Listing

1. Foxey Lady
2. Manic Depression
3. Red House - Jimi Hendrix
4. Can You See Me
5. Love Or Confusion
6. I Don't Live Today
7. May This Be Love
8. Fire
9. Third Stone From The Sun
10. Remember
11. Are You Experienced?
12. Hey Joe
13. Stone Free
14. Purple Haze
15. 51st Anniversary
16. The Wind Cries Mary
17. Highway Chile

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1216 in Music
• Released on: 1999-07-26
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 60 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
As emblematic of its time as of its sorcerer-like creator, 1967's Are You Experienced? unleashed Jimi Hendrix onto a world in the midst of such cultural and musical shake-ups that it really didn't seem as "far out" as it actually was. It wasn't just Hendrix's virtuosic skill as a pure player that was so impressive; it was, even more, the range and scope of sheer sound that he coaxed, cajoled and ripped out of his instrument. "Purple Haze", "Manic Depression" and "I Don't Live Today" filled ears with indelible sonic images and songs like "Foxey Lady" and "Fire" pointed the way toward a new brand of rock-charged soul music. And how about a hand for drummer Mitch Mitchell? --Billy Altman

Customer Reviews

The Clamps Are Off
Born in 1940's Seattle, Jimi Hendrix would go on to be the ultimate guitar Legend in both his native America and more crucially here in the UK. In the mid sixties, Eric Clapton was God having given the blues sound a complete overhaul, however in the late sixties Clapton was revealed to be just a mere prophet for Hendrix had arrived to save us all.

It's well documented that Hendrix had a gift for creating noises from his guitar that only he could create, this much is true, problem is he raised the bar to a level which has not even been sniffed at since the time of his tragic death in 1970, which certainly has left a big hole on mankind's ability to create.

Despite Hendrix's ability and obvious talent, it was only in the last 5 years of his life that he managed to have the huge impact his talent deserved. In 1966, The Animals were on the verge of breaking up, and their bassist Chas Chandler decided he would try his arm at management. Luckily for us, a chance viewing in New York of Hendrix playing blues in a club convinced a gob smacked Chandler that he needed to get this guy over to England.

In England, a rhythm section was forged around him, arguably one of the best rhythm sections ever created, Mitch Mitchell, possibly one of the greatest drummers ever to pick up a pair of sticks and Noel Redding on bass, both with the key ability to keep up with Hendrix and produce the glue needed to make the songs sound the way they did. This new three piece would be called The Jimi Hendrix Experience.

Their first record in the UK was a triumph, released in 1967 on MCA, Are You Experienced was a stunning debut, incorporating at its base the fundamentals of Blues, Rock and Soul with a more futuristic fuzz trying to kick out from all angles, there was also an undeniable jazz influence coming from Hendrix's rhythm section which probably allowed all these elements to gel with such wonderful results, The Jimi Hendrix Experience had arrived.

Nothing more demonstrates the power in Hendrix's fingers then Foxey Lady, imagine if you will just sitting there having placed the needle on the record to hear that guitar slowly marauding its way through your amp and breaking through to produce one of the most hypnotic guitar riffs ever created, brilliant. Yet more Psychedelic wonders and memorable riffs follow with Manic Depression and Purple Haze, but there is much more then just that. There's a mental instrumental with Third Stone From The Sun, and even a tender side being demonstrated on the album, with beautifully poetic songs like The Wind Cries Mary and Hey Joe

This is album is frenzied and raw yet at the same time is beautiful, this album was responsible for launching Hendrix onto a stage much bigger then those days where he was in the Isley Brothers backing band a few years earlier, the clamps were now off and he was loose, this was where the legend began.

Thanks to later issues, there is now no missing links between the UK version of this album and the US version, its now all available on one album, if you're one of those collector types, you might want to buy both versions, but if not, I'm sure the 17 track version will do you fine.

The greatest guitarist of all time.
This was the first Hendrix record I ever bought and it hits you like a tyson punch, Jimi displays everything and more in just 17 songs. Ranging from the sexy 'Foxy lady' to the rock of 'can you see me' to the bluesy 'red house' to the physedelic 'purple haze'. Theres killer riffs (purple haze), fantastic solo's (Hey joe) and brilliant drumming by M.Mitchell on Fire and Manic depression just to name a few.
If you like this as i do i recomend any other Hendrix album partically Electric ladyland and Axis as bold as love.

Fortieth anniversary of an immensely influential musical milestone... too bad that some of the tracks only offer sub-par sound

The other evening, I listened to this CD and, as the music flew out of the speakers, I felt that the sound quality of the first track ("Foxey Lady") was definitely not... right. Similar problems appeared on other - though not all - of the tracks.

Now, do not get me wrong. As a fan of older musical styles, I can immerse myself in the music extracted from the oft-damaged grooves of vintage 78 rpm pressed before 1930.

Consequently, I am still both moved and amazed at Hendrix' genius on this monumental recording, which I originally bought in 1967. What bugs me is that it should sound so much better... and that it does not. Moreover, I have read lots of professional and fan reviews of this CD. I agree wholeheartedly with most of the praise afforded to its intrinsic artistic value but I find it strange that almost nothing is ever said about the actual sound quality, or sometimes lack thereof.

Hendrix' first album was recorded about 40 years ago. The recordings took place - approximately - between October 1966 and March 1967, mostly at the state-of-the-art Olympic studios. The original engineer was the very gifted Eddie Kramer whilst producer Chas Chandler had lots of studio expertise. All the right ingredients were there to have very good sonics.

After listening through the speakers, I turned them off and listened through a pair of Sennheiser headphones.

At this point, I feel that I should remind the reader that the second part of the sixties saw the appearance of affordable stereo listening equipment. The increased interest in stereo records among the pop and rock public led the record companies - which owned huge back catalogues of older, mono recordings - to devise a process to electronic "re-channel" these mono takes into something mimicking stereo.
To this effect, a simple, low-cost process was set up; it only implied to separate the two tracks of the master tape so as to spread the sound across the stereo field by directing higher-frequency sound into one channel and lower-frequency sound into the other.
This perversion of the original stereo concept gave awful results (just think about those "fake stereo" releases - both on LP's and CD's - of the Rolling Stones Decca/London material released prior to "Aftermath" (1966). It was not until the release of the 2002 Abkco "DSD" remasters that it was possible to have again access to this music the way it was originally designed to sound.

"Foxey Lady", on the Hendrix CD under review is, definitely, a "fake stereo" (or "re-channeled mono) recording; the "stereo content" relies essentially on Jimi's vocals being panned to the left and the background "foxy" vocal interjections being panned to the right. This effect is highly unnatural. The bass guitar is not well defined and the drums lack real punch. The overall sound is muffled.

The very same problem is already apparent on the first US CD reissue (Reprise 6261-2 in "long box" presentation). Noted engineer Joe Gastwirt takes credit for the digital remastering.
Joe Gastwirt stated, in 1997, that "I don't wish to get into a major controversy, but I know the tapes that I worked from had edits and splices all over them. And it is very, very unlikely that a copy of a master tape would have splices on it."

On the "The Jimi Hendrix Experience" 4-CD box set (MCA 112316), Kramer remastered an early, alternate version of "Foxey Lady." The actual musical performance on this alternate take is artistically inferior to the standard version. However, the alternate take comes in true mono and exhibits a much-improved sound quality. Consequently, the track sounds much more as if a real power trio was performing on it. This is true for Hendrix' vocals and guitar as well as for Noel Redding's and Mitch Mitchell's contributions.

Extending the analytic process to the whole CD under review, I came to the conclusion that ten tracks from the latest MCA remaster appear either in true mono or true stereo, without any obvious post-recording trickery involved. They are: "Red House" (mono), "May This Be Love" (stereo), "Fire" (stereo), "Third Stone From The Sun" (stereo), "Remember" (stereo), "Are You Experienced" (stereo), "Hey Joe" (stereo!), "51st Anniversary" (mono), "The Wind Cries Mary" (stereo) and "Highway Chile" (mono.)

Conversely, the seven remaining tracks feature inferior, "fake stereo" sound quality. They are: "Foxey Lady", "Manic Depression", "Can You See Me", "Love or Confusion", "I Don't Live Today", "Stone Free" and "Purple Haze."

As both Kramer and Gastwirt are definitely skilled "good guys", the evoked problems are linked to the recording tapes that they had to use to do the CD remastering.

At the time of the latest MCA remasters, the company claimed that: "For the first time, the [ORIGINAL] two-track master tapes were used to remaster [...] "Are You Experienced?" [...] [This album], released on MCA's Experience Hendrix label, mark[s] the recovery of the original master tapes after some two decades in limbo." Well, I think that this assertion is very... bold (just like the axis!) It is also misleading.

True, the overall sound on Kramer's latest MCA remasters is noticeably cleaner than on earlier CD's. This is because the quality of the analog-to-digital converters has improved a lot since Gastwirt's earlier work. Aural evidence reported above clearly shows that Eddie Kramer could NOT fix any of the "fake stereo" problems already encountered by Gastwirt.

In my opinion, it is obvious that some of the original master tapes have disappeared. Such an occurence is not exceptional in the case of vintage recording masters. Actually, in an interview, Eddie Kramer declared that the case of the missing masters was no mystery: "We [Kramer and members of the Hendrix family] went on a long search and found 85 percent of the masters [from all the studio sessions.] We found tapes in studios and buried in record company libraries. Some tapes [had even to be] bought from collectors."

For this reason, the only way to listen to the original, superior sounding mono mixes of the seven inferior tracks mentioned above is to listen to good copies of the "Are You Experienced" and "Smash Hits" mono Track LP's (no mean feat nowadays.)

It is also quite possible that a remastering based on original vinyl sources (or repressings based on good condition metal parts) could yield better sonic results. This process has already been used for fairly recent material. I do not know if it could be used here.

One last advice: the easiest way to discriminate between "true stereo" tracks and "fake stereo" tracks is to switch the sound from stereo to mono. If the sound, especially on the vocals, appears to "collapse" (the vocals are heard at a much lower volume level) when switching to mono, then the track is definitely mastered from a "fake stereo" source. When the mastering is from a true stereo source, the balance between the vocal and instrumental sounds will stay fairly constant when switching to mono. This effect is more perceptible still on headphones.