Okay, I really did want to have a meaningful workout, so I’ve replaced the ‘Hardpore Cornography‘ with something a little more, well, meaningful and inspired to plank, push-up and crunch to, the ‘Midnight Lightning‘ album by Jimi Hendrix.
I have absolutely no idea how this album came to be in my collection. I either rescued it from somewhere or it was given to me, I’m not too sure. Hell, I might have actually paid money for it. Who knows? But I have never actually listened to it so I may as well rectify that now.
‘Midnight Lightning’ is a posthumous compilation album by American rock guitarist Jimi Hendrix. It was released in November of 1975 by Reprise Records in the United States and Polydor Records in the United Kingdom. In actuality, it was the sixth studio album released after his death and the second to be produced by Alan Douglas and Tony Bongiovi. The songs used on the album consisted of post-Jimi Hendrix Experience recordings that originally featured Billy Cox on bass and either Mitch Mitchell or Buddy Miles on drums.
Douglas continued his controversial methods he had adopted on ‘Crash Landing’ and brought in many of the same session musicians to overdub parts of songs. The only original recording (apart from those by Hendrix) was Mitchell’s drumming on ‘Hear My Train‘. In response to the previous outcry from fans and critics, Douglas did not claim co-writer credit for any songs on the album. Despite the fact that the album included reworkings of the popular live songs ‘Hear My Train A Comin’‘ and ‘Machine Gun‘, the album was not as well received as its predecessor, peaking at only #43 in the US and #46 in the UK.
The opening riff to ‘Foxy Lady‘ provides the foundation for the instrumental ‘Trash Man’, nd no amount of bastardization can take away from the genius guitarist his legacy. If you take this work at face value, without the baggage of what “producer” Alan Douglas did to the tapes, it’s still Hendrix. Maybe God allowed this series of posthumous albums to happen so the world could see that Hendrix’s work could survive doctoring and musicians jamming with his art after the fact.
Whatever.
It’s still great workout music and I dig it. Personally I think the dreamy quality of ‘Gypsy Boy‘ is amazing as is Jimi’s funky rendition of Carl Perkins ‘Blue Suede Shoes‘. It may not be “classic Jimi”, per se, but it is “Jimi classic” so to speak.
Now, time to EAT!
