Axis: Bold as Love

Recording

Following the completion of Are You Experienced at the end of April, 1967, the Jimi Hendrix Experience continued their schedule of regular recording sessions, returning to Olympic Studios in London on May 4, to begin composing material for a follow-up LP. With Chas Chandler as producer, Eddie Kramer as engineer, and George Chkiantz as second engineer, the band started the session by working on a Noel Redding original that he had written about hippies titled, "She's So Fine". It featured back-ground vocals that were performed by Jimi Hendrix and Mitch Mitchell; Redding later recalled that Hendrix was enthusiastic to record the song because it was written in A with an open G chord that he enjoyed playing. They achieved a working master on the 23rd take, over which Redding overdubbed his lead vocal. The band also made initial recordings of what would become "If 6 Was 9", using the working titles of "Section A" and "Section B" to identify its two distinct segments. During a session that took place the following day, Hendrix and Mitchell improved "Section B", now titled "Symphony of Experience", by re-recording most of their guitar and drum parts. A reduction mix prepared by Kramer made room for additional overdubs, including Hendrix's lead vocal, backing vocals, and a percussion effect created by Chandler, Hendrix, and guests Graham Nash and Gary Leeds stomping their feet on a drum platform. As an additional oddity, Hendrix played a recorder on the track, achieving what they considered a satisfactory sound despite his complete lack of formal training with the instrument. Also recorded during these sessions was the experimental track "EXP". In the span of two days, the group recorded basic tracks for seven compositions, though only three of them were included on the album.

On May 9, the Experience reconvened at Olympic with Chandler, Kramer, and Chkiantz. Hendrix had been curious about a harpsichord that was stored in the facility's Studio A, so on this day he sat at the instrument and began writing "The Burning of the Midnight Lamp", a song that became the fourth UK single for the Experience. Hendrix attempted four takes before stopping for the day, producing a rough demo that was approximately a minute and a half in length. On May 10, the band performed their latest single, "The Wind Cries Mary", on the BBC television program Top of the Pops.

After a month-long break from the studio while they played gigs in Europe, the Experience returned to Olympic on Jun 5. They devoted the session to a new Hendrix song titled "Cat Talking to Me", recording 17 takes before deciding that the second was the superior version, to which they added guitar and percussion overdubs after Kramer prepared a reduction mix. Although the song showed promise, no further work was completed on the track, which remains unreleased.

On June 18, 1967, the Experience made their US debut at the Monterey Pop Festival. Immediately after the festival, Bill Graham's booked them for a series of five concerts at the Fillmore. While they were in California, Chandler booked session time for June 28, 29, and 30th at Houston Studios in Los Angeles. Although they worked on "Burning of the Midnight Lamp" and a new Hendrix composition, "The Stars That Play with Laughing Sam's Dice", they abandoned the inferior recordings. Chandler commented: "I booked three days there because I was told it was a state-of-the-art studio, but it was dire. The place was like a rehearsal studio compared to Olympic. Los Angeles was so far behind at that time." After a week of performances in Los Angeles and New York, time was booked at Mayfair Studios for July 6 and 7.

Axis: Bold As Love's scheduled release date was almost delayed when Hendrix lost the master tape of side one of the LP, leaving it in the back seat of a London taxi. With the deadline looming, Hendrix, Chas Chandler, and engineer Eddie Kramer remixed most of side one in a single overnight session, but they could not match the quality of the lost mix of "If 6 Was 9". Bassist Noel Redding had a tape recording of this mix, which had to be smoothed out with an iron as it had gotten wrinkled. During the verses, Hendrix doubled his singing with a guitar line which he played one octave lower than his vocals. Hendrix voiced his disappointment about having re-mixed the album so quickly, and he felt that it could have been better had they been given more time.

Although Kramer was always patient with Hendrix, who often demanded numerous re-takes, by October 1967, Chandler had grown weary of the guitarist's perfectionism. Noel Redding was also frustrated by Hendrix's repeated demands for re-takes, and he began to resent Hendrix's explicit instructions regarding what he played in the studio. Hendrix and Mitchell had begun to express their opinions regarding creative choices that had been left up to Chandler during the recording of Are You Experienced. Mitchell commented: "Axis was the first time that it became apparent that Jimi was pretty good working behind the mixing board, as well as playing, and had some positive ideas of how he wanted things recorded. It could have been the start of any potential conflict between him and Chas in the studio."

Music and lyrics

Many of the songs on Axis: Bold as Love were composed with studio recording techniques in mind and as a result were rarely performed live. Only "Spanish Castle Magic" and "Little Wing" were performed regularly. The lyrics of "Spanish Castle Magic" were inspired by The Spanish Castle, a dance hall in what is now Des Moines, Washington near Seattle where Hendrix jammed with local rock groups during his high school years. On "Little Wing" Hendrix plays his guitar through a Leslie speaker for the first time (a revolving speaker which creates a wavering effect, that is typically used with electric organs). According to Colin Larkin, Axis focused less on guitar playing than the previous Experience album, and more on Hendrix's "gifts as a songwriter". Author Charles Shaar Murray described Axis as "lighter, looser and more melodic" than its predecessor.

Axis: Bold as Love, opens with the track "EXP", which innovatively utilized microphonic and harmonic feedback. It also showcased an experimental stereo panning effect in which sounds emanating from Hendrix's guitar move through the stereo image, revolving around the listener. The piece reflected his growing interest in science fiction and outer space. Author Keith Shadwick described the track as "some of the wildest music Hendrix ever released."

"Wait Until Tomorrow" is a pop song with an R&B guitar riff with Mitchell and Redding singing backing vocals. The fifth track, "Ain't No Telling", is a rock song with a complex structure despite its short length. "Little Wing", as Hendrix himself said, was his impression of the Monterey Pop Festival put into the form of a girl. "If 6 Was 9", the last song on side one, is the album's longest track and arguably the most psychedelic; Gary Leeds (from The Walker Brothers) and Graham Nash use their feet during the outro to make some stomping. The song features prominently on the soundtrack for the 1969 counterculture film, Easy Rider.

"You Got Me Floatin'", a rock song opening with a swirling backwards guitar solo (which is absent on the mysterious, differently mixed Polydor version of this LP [only available in stereo], which outside France and the UK was the only one available in Europe), opens the second side of the album. Roy Wood and Trevor Burton from The Move, who toured with Hendrix on a package tour through Britain during winter 1967, supplied backing vocals. The following track, "Castles Made of Sand", is a ballad also making use of a backwards guitar solo. "She's So Fine", Redding's contribution to the album as a composer, a very British pop/rock Who-influenced affair features Redding on lead vocals with help from Mitchell. "One Rainy Wish" begins as a ballad but develops a rock feel during the chorus that is in a different time signature than the verses.

The song "Little Miss Lover" was the first to feature a percussive muted wah-wah effect (with the fretboard hand "killing" notes) - a technique that was later adopted by many guitarists. The final song of the album, "Bold as Love", opens very abruptly. With a psychedelic chorus and an extended solo at the end it fades out the album. An early Mellotron instrument can be heard in the outro to the title track as well. In 2005, Rolling Stone ranked "Little Wing" number 366 in their list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

Hendrix composed the album's title track and finale around two verses and two choruses, during which he pairs emotions with personas, comparing them to colors. The song's coda features the first recording of stereo phasing. Numerous attempts at a basic rhythm track were undertaken before a satisfactory one was achieved on the 27th take. Shadwick described the composition as "possibly the most ambitious piece on Axis, the extravagant metaphors of the lyrics suggesting a growing confidence" in Hendrix's songwriting. His guitar playing throughout the song is marked by chordal arpeggios and contrapuntal motion, with tremolo-picked partial chords providing the musical foundation for the chorus, which culminates in what musicologist Andy Aledort described as "simply one of the greatest electric guitar solos ever played". The track fades out on tremolo-picked thirty-second note double stops. In 2011, Guitar World ranked the track number 24 in a list of Hendrix's 100 greatest performances.

Artwork and packaging

Hendrix expressed dismay regarding the album cover art, which depicts him and the Experience as various forms of Vishnu, incorporating a painting of them by Roger Law, from a photo-portrait by Karl Ferris. Hendrix stated that the cover would have been more appropriate had it highlighted his American Indian heritage. The painted image of the Experience was then superimposed on top of a copy of a mass-produced religious poster. Hendrix commented: "The three of us have nothing to do with what's on the Axis cover." Unlike the previous album's cover art, both the UK and US editions featured the same image. Hindus have since expressed anger on the appropriation of the deity Vishnu for the album cover and poster. The Malaysian government's Home Ministry instituted a ban on the artwork from June 2014 to protect religious sensitivities following complaints.

In November, a giant black and white blow-up of the Hapshash/Osiris poster featuring Hendrix dressed as a Native American wearing a feathered War Bonnet, was used as a background to his appearance on Hoepla, a controversial Dutch TV show. The original poster featured fantastic day-glo pink, orange & blue offset lithographs printed on gold foil. This poster, although produced later in London and supposedly commissioned by Hendrix, had text along the top to make it appear as if it was an original poster advertising his 1967 Fillmore concerts. The original prints of this poster are presumed to all be in private collections, and later copies which have surfaced have fetched high prices at auction.

The original Track UK issue came in a gatefold sleeve with a large black and white portrait photo of the group by Donald Silverstein spread over the inside and an orange sheet insert with overprinted lyrics in red; the allegedly high cost of this packaging was a topic of note in the music press. The US issue had no insert and instead of the group photo inside, had the lyrics. In Europe, the Polydor issue had no lyrics but added a 1-inch-wide (25 mm) white border round the inside portrait, while the French dispensed with the original cover entirely and instead used a non-gatefold sleeve with a photo of the group taken from a recent French TV show on the front.

Release and reception

Track released Axis: Bold as Love in the UK on December 1, 1967, where it peaked at number five and spent 16 weeks on the charts. In February 1968, it charted at number three in the United States. The album was also well received by music critics, who praised its mixture of hard rock, rhythm and blues, and jazz.

In a contemporary review for Rolling Stone, Jim Miller hailed Axis: Bold as Love as "the refinement of white noise into psychedelia ... the finest voodoo album that any rock group has produced to date". Q magazine wrote in a retrospective review that the album "dazzles as the Experience creates a genre probably short-lived because nobody else could play it". AllMusic's Cub Koda considered it a demonstration of Hendrix's "remarkable growth and depth" as a songwriter, utilizing Curtis Mayfield-like soul guitar work, "Dylanesque lyrical imagery, and Fuzz Face hyperactivity to produce yet another side to his grand psychedelic musical vision". According to author Peter Doggett, the record "heralded a new subtlety in Hendrix's work", while BBC Music's Chris Jones said it is distinguished from his other Hendrix albums as his "coming-of-age-in-songwriting album ... his peak in crafting pop rock perfection".

Critics also found Axis: Bold as Love to be the least memorable of the Experience's three studio releases. According to Richie Unterberger, it was the least impressive from the Experience, while Kris Needs called the record a "transitional, but often overlooked, masterpiece". In a mixed review for Blender, music essayist Robert Christgau acknowledged the adequate production and guitar quality on the album, but cautioned listeners of Mitchell's drumming, the music's "spaced-out lightness", and the short tracks: "half the songs are forgettable as songs if fine as recordings."

In 2005, Rolling Stone ranked Axis: Bold as Love number 82 on their list of the 500 greatest albums of all time, and the top spot on their list of the 40 greatest stoner albums in 2013. Guitarist magazine named the album number 7 on their list of "the most influential guitar albums of all time". In 2015, Consequence of Sound described the album as "a compelling psychedelic masterpiece." The album was also included in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die.

Track listing

All tracks written by Jimi Hendrix, except where noted.

The last recording by Hendrix to have a dedicated mono mix, which was only released in the UK and US. The album was released in stereo in the rest of the world. The Polydor (Europe and Japan only) release mysteriously had a different stereo mix from that originally released in the UK, France, the US and the rest of the world. It later appeared on a Backtrack budget LP release but before long replaced the original mix on all Polydor reissues and re-pressings, outside of French Barclay territory and US/Canada Reprise, including the first UK CD. This may have been a simple confusion over which tape in Polydor's library was sent to the mastering facility. Later CD reissues have reverted to the original mix. The 'Backtrack' mix can be found on Polydor CD 813 572-2, manufactured in West Germany.

Personnel