James Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix was an American guitarist, songwriter and singer. Although his mainstream career spanned only four years, he is widely regarded as the greatest and one of the most influential electric guitarists in the history of popular music, and one of the most celebrated musicians of the 20th century. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame describes him as "arguably the greatest instrumentalist in the history of rock music."
Jimmy James and the Blue Flames was a short-lived American rock group that was fronted by Jimi Hendrix, who was then going by the name "Jimmy James". The band was Hendrix's first extended foray into the 1966 Greenwich Village music scene and included future Spirit guitarist Randy California. At various New York clubs, they played a mix of rock, blues, and rhythm and blues songs as well as early versions of songs that became part of the Jimi Hendrix Experience repertoire. It was at such a performance that the Animals' bassist Chas Chandler first heard their rendition of "Hey Joe" and decided to invite Hendrix to England and become his producer.
War is an American funk/rock/soul/Latin band from Long Beach, California, known for several hit songs . Formed in 1969, War is a musical crossover band that fuses elements of rock, funk, jazz, Latin, rhythm and blues, psychedelia, and reggae. According to music writer Colin Larkin, their "potent fusion of funk, R&B, rock and Latin styles produced a progressive soul sound", while Martin C. Strong calls them "one of the fiercest progressive soul combos of the '70s". Their album The World Is a Ghetto was Billboard's best-selling album of 1973. The band transcended racial and cultural barriers with a multi-ethnic line-up. War was subject to many line-up changes over the course of its existence, leaving member Leroy "Lonnie" Jordan as the only original member in the current line-up; four other members created a new group called the Lowrider Band.
The Monterey International Pop Festival was a three-day music festival held June 16 to 18, 1967, at the Monterey County Fairgrounds in Monterey, California. The festival is remembered for the first major American appearances by the Jimi Hendrix Experience, the Who and Ravi Shankar, the first large-scale public performance of Janis Joplin and the introduction of Otis Redding to a mass American audience.
Eric Victor Burdon is an English singer and songwriter. He was previously the lead vocalist of the R&B and rock band the Animals and the funk band War. He is regarded as one of the British Invasion's most distinctive singers with his deep, powerful blues-rock voice. Burdon is also known for his intense stage performances.
"All Along the Watchtower" is a song by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan from his eighth studio album, John Wesley Harding (1967). The song was written by Dylan and produced by Bob Johnston. The song's lyrics, which in its original version contain twelve lines, feature a conversation between a joker and a thief. The song has been subject to various interpretations; some reviewers have noted that it echoes lines in the Book of Isaiah, Chapter 21, verses 5–9. Dylan has released several different live performances, and versions of the song are included on some of his subsequent greatest hits compilations.
Rick Derringer is an American musician, producer, and songwriter. He achieved success during the 1960s with his then band, the McCoys. Their debut single, "Hang on Sloopy", was a number-one hit in 1965 and became a classic track of the garage rock era. The McCoys then had seven songs that charted in the top 100, including versions of "Fever" and "Come on Let's Go".
Bryan James "Chas" Chandler was an English musician, record producer and manager, best known as the original bassist in The Animals, for which he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1994. He also managed the band Slade, and Jimi Hendrix, about whom he was regularly interviewed until Chandler's death in 1996.
"Hang On Sloopy" is a 1964 song written by Wes Farrell and Bert Berns. Rhythm and blues vocal group the Vibrations were the first to record the tune in 1964. Atlantic Records released it as a single, which reached No. 26 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. The song is associated with Ohio State University and is Ohio's official rock song.
Electric Lady Studios is a recording studio in Greenwich Village, New York City. It was commissioned by rock musician Jimi Hendrix in 1968 and designed by architect John Storyk and audio engineer Eddie Kramer by 1970. Hendrix spent only ten weeks recording in Electric Lady before his death that year, but it quickly became a famed studio used by many top-selling recording artists from the 1970s onwards, including Led Zeppelin, Stevie Wonder, and David Bowie.
Band of Gypsys is a live album by Jimi Hendrix and the first without his original group, the Jimi Hendrix Experience. It was recorded on January 1, 1970, at the Fillmore East in New York City with Billy Cox on bass and Buddy Miles on drums, frequently referred to as the Band of Gypsys. The album mixes funk and rhythm and blues elements with hard rock and jamming, an approach which later became the basis of funk rock. It contains previously unreleased songs and was the last full-length Hendrix album released before his death six months later.
"Hey Joe" is an American song from the 1960s that has become a rock standard and has been performed in many musical styles by hundreds of different artists. The lyrics tell of a man who is on the run and planning to head to Mexico after shooting his unfaithful wife. In 1962, Billy Roberts registered "Hey Joe" for copyright in the United States.
The Strangeloves were a band created in 1964 by the New York-based American songwriting and production team of Bob Feldman, Jerry Goldstein, and Richard Gottehrer. They initially pretended to be from Australia. The Strangeloves' most successful singles were "I Want Candy," "Cara-Lin", and "Night Time".
Frank Michael Jeffery was an English music business manager of the 1960s who is best known for his management of The Animals and Jimi Hendrix, whom he co-managed for a time with former Animals bassist Chas Chandler. A former associate of noted English pop impresario Don Arden, Jeffery was and remains a controversial figure.
"Wild Thing" is a song written by American songwriter Chip Taylor and popularized by the English rock band the Troggs. It was originally recorded and released by the American rock band the Wild Ones in 1965, but it did not chart. The Troggs' single reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 and number two on the UK Singles Chart in 1966. Their version of "Wild Thing" was ranked at number 257 on the Rolling Stone magazine's 2004 list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. It has also been performed by many other musicians.
Richard Gottehrer is an American songwriter, record producer and record label executive. In 1997, he co-founded The Orchard with longtime business partner Scott Cohen, an independent music distribution company. His career began as a Brill Building songwriter in the 1960s. His first number one record as a songwriter and producer was "My Boyfriend's Back" by the Angels, followed by other hits like "Hang On Sloopy" by the McCoys and "I Want Candy" by the Strangeloves, of which the latter Gottehrer was a member. In 1966, he formed Sire Records with Seymour Stein, which played a crucial role in the rise of new wave, and went on to launch the careers of Blondie, Madonna, Ramones and Talking Heads. His career continued as producer for the Go-Go's' 1981 debut album, Dr. Feelgood, Richard Hell, the Bongos and Moonpools & Caterpillars' first release with a major label, 1995's Lucky Dumpling. In 2013, the Orchard was described as "the biggest digital music distributor on the planet".
"I Want Candy" is a song written and originally recorded by the Strangeloves in 1965 that reached No. 11 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart. It is a famous example of a song that uses the Bo Diddley beat.
"Monterey" is a 1967 song by Eric Burdon & The Animals. The music and lyrics were composed by the group's members, Eric Burdon, John Weider, Vic Briggs, Danny McCulloch, and Barry Jenkins. The song provides an oral account of the June 1967 Monterey Pop Festival, at which the Animals performed. Burdon namedrops several of the acts who performed at the festival such as the Byrds, Jefferson Airplane, the Who, the Grateful Dead, and Jimi Hendrix. In 1968, two different video clips of the song were aired.
Guilty! is a 1971 album by Eric Burdon and Jimmy Witherspoon. It was the first release by Burdon after he left War.
Alvin Taylor is an American drummer, producer and musical director, who is best known for his work with Elton John, Eric Burdon, George Harrison, Billy Preston, and Bob Welch.
