Rolling Stone first revealed the upcoming plans from Experience Hendrix and Legacy Recordings for the next round of Jimi Hendrix reissues, and all of the info is now in! This wave should please even the most demanding fans of the late, legendary guitar god.
On September 13, Experience Hendrix will reissue In the West and Winterland for the first time under its aegis. In the West, a posthumously-released 1972 collection of live Hendrix performances, was originally issued by Polydor and Reprise. The album contains songs from Hendrix's performances at the Royal Albert Hall on February 24, 1969, the San Diego Sports Arena on May 24, 1969, Berkeley Community Theatre on May 30, 1970 and the Isle of Wight Festival on August 30, 1970. According to both Experience Hendrix's item page and the official press release, the upcoming reissue, housed in a digipak on CD and also available on vinyl, will expand the album's eight tracks (including covers of "Blue Suede Shoes," "Johnny B. Goode" and "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band") with five new songs, but the track listing only indicates three extras ("Fire," "I Don't Live Today" and "Spanish Castle Magic"). The accompanying 24-page booklet will include rare and previously unreleased photographs by Jim Marshall, the man behind the album's classic cover photo.
Live at Winterland with The Jimi Hendrix Experience was first released in 1987 on the Rykodisc label. Live at Winterland documented The Experience's performances at the famous San Francisco ballroom (also home of The Band's The Last Waltz) where they played two shows each night on October 10, 11 and 12, 1968. The big news is that Winterland (with simplified title) will be expanded to a 4-CD box set, therefore making an ideal holiday gift. The box will include a 36-page booklet with notes by David Fricke and previously unpublished photographs. If you prefer vinyl to CD, an 8-LP version will be released concurrently, and for those who don't want the whole shebang, a single-disc highlights set will also arrive. Amazon.com will offer a 5-CD exclusive edition and an 8-LP/1-CD exclusive set. Both packages include a bonus disc consisting of four recordings from the February 4, 1968 performance at Winterland not otherwise represented on the box set. These tracks were previously only available on the Dagger Records "official bootleg" Paris '67/San Francisco '68.
Winterland, the box, will be preceded by a single release of "Like a Rolling Stone" b/w "Purple Haze" in a previously unreleased Winterland performance not available on the box itself. The single will be available on Tuesday, August 23 in the United States and one day earlier overseas. One CD of Winterland highlights will also arrive on September 13.
Complementing these audio releases will be two new DVDs, an uncut edition of Blue Wild Angel: Live at the Isle of Wight, and Jimi Hendrix: The Dick Cavett Show, presenting all of the programs in which Hendrix guested with the famed raconteur. Mike has all of the details on these two releases here.
Hit the jump for the track listings for In the West and Winterland plus pre-order links at Experience Hendrix!
Jimi Hendrix, In the West (Polydor, 1972 - reissued Experience Hendrix/Legacy, 2011)
- The Queen
- Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
- Little Wing
- Fire*
- I Don't Live Today*
- Spanish Castle Magic*
- Red House
- Johnny B. Goode
- Lover Man
- Blue Suede Shoes
- Voodoo Child (Slight Return)
*denotes bonus track not on original LP
The Jimi Hendrix Experience, Winterland (Some material originally on Rykodisc, 1987 - reissued Experience Hendrix/Legacy, 2011)
CD 1: 10/10/68 Winterland Ballroom, San Francisco
- Tax Free
- Lover Man
- Sunshine of Your Love
- Hear My Train A Comin’
- Killing Floor
- Foxey Lady
- Hey Joe
- Star Spangled Banner
- Purple Haze
CD 2: 10/11/68 Winterland Ballroom, San Francisco
- Tax Free
- Like a Rolling Stone
- Lover Man
- Hey Joe
- Fire
- Foxey Lady
- Are You Experienced
- Red House
- Purple Haze
CD 3: 10/12/68 Winterland Ballroom, San Francisco
- Fire
- Lover Man
- Like a Rolling Stone
- Manic Depression
- Sunshine of Your Love
- Little Wing
- Spanish Castle Magic
- Red House
- Hey Joe
- Purple Haze
- Wild Thing
CD 4: Bonus Disc - Winterland Ballroom, San Francisco
- Foxy Lady
- Are You Experienced
- Voodoo Child (Slight Return)
- Red House
- Star Spangled Banner
- Purple Haze
- Jimi Hendrix: Boston Garden Backstage Interview
CD 5: Amazon-Exclusive Bonus Disc - Winterland Ballroom, San Francisco, 2/4/68 (Available with vinyl or CD)
- Killing Floor
- Red House
- Dear Mr. Fantasy (Part One)
- Dear Mr. Fantasy (Part Two)
I wonder if they're going to reissue Hendrix In The West on vinyl, too, just like they did with the three albums of the Jimi Hendrix Experience last year when they released another remastered versions, albeit in limited quantities. They probably won't, due to this being only a live album, but it would be interesting to see if they actually did.
Winterland!!!!! Finally. Finally. Finally. As Joe said, even hardcore fans like myself will be happy with this. I've had the Winterland bootlegs for ages and while they are pretty decent quality it will be incredible to have the real deal in top notch sound. Everyone has their wishlists of releases and this has always been my top wish because these are some great shows. I've heard people say they aren't that great but I think Winterland is some of his absolute best live stuff. Lots of jamming, great variety on the setlists, and some definitive live versions of certain songs like Are You Experienced, Hey Joe, Fire, Tax Free and Sunshine of Your Love. Yes I'm ecstatic over this! Thanks for this news.
I've never heard In the West, but I'm looking forward to it.
Now Winterland... THAT'S big news. Long out of print, and a fine live compilation in its own right, now a 4 disc set?? SOLD.
GREAT news about Winterland! I am very disappointed that the Royal Albert Hall show was not released in full as advertised some time ago. I wonder why they would put out such a hodgepodge of live tracks rather than another full show? We already have two of the shows from which some of the tracks are taken- poor form.
Is Experience Hendrix releasing ALL of the Oct 10/11/12 1968 shows at Winterland, or just selected highlights? I did an A-B tracklist comparison of the Whoopy Cat bootleg discs with the new box set, and there certainly are omissions and additions.
I was thinking the same thing. Not that I'm complaining but it would be interesting to hear an explanation why some of the songs are being withheld.
You know why.... so they can release the ultimate edition in 5 years and have us buy it again.
I've only heard select tunes from the Winterland concerts over the years and the quality of the recordings was poor so I really don't know what to expect. But if you've never heard 'In the West' before, you are in for a treat. I have a mint condition Polydor lp I bought in '72 and.....wow. I still get a buzz every time I listen to Voodoo Child (Slight Return) and Red House. They close out sides 1 & 2 respectively and they are 2 of the 3 best guitar solos I've heard, ever (Machine Gun on the Band of Gypsys lp being the third).
If you are planing on buying new the Hendrix in the West album think again. Two of the original tracks Little Wing and Voodoo Child recorded at The Royal Albert Hall gig are being replaced by versions from different shows. I guess for legal reason but why call it Hendrix in the West when clearly it's something else.
http://www.authentichendrix.com/Product.aspx?cp=103_47969&pc=JHCD048
I did not see the replacements : a disgrace!
Not too surprising, I guess. There's always been legal disputes over the Royal Albert Hall concert audio and film:
http://ipkitten.blogspot.com/2010/08/blackburn-royal-albert-hall-hendrix-not.html
I have the original vinyl and the Polydor CD of "In the West". The track listing disguised the RAH recordings "Little Wing" and "Voodoo Child" as being from the 1969 San Diego show to sneak them past the lawyers.
The Hendrix estate is still trying to get legal control of RAH, but it's been going on for 40 years!:
https://theseconddisc.com/2011/06/22/hendrix-in-the-west-emerges-with-new-performances-retooled-track-list/
For the definitive version of Jimi RAH (at least until the legal battle is resolved) you can't beat the one released by... ...Eric Burdon! It was sold by him via mail order under his "Risin' Sun Productions" until a court injunction. They used to pop up on eBay and commanded a fortune. I have a copy and it's the best and most natural sounding of all the versions out there, and it doesn't cut off where "Voodoo Child" leads into "Room Full of Mirrors".
Anyway, from wikipedia:
The Royal Albert Hall concert was among the first records to be massively bootlegged. It remains the most common "unofficial" Hendrix release, widely available under numerous labels with varying quality. In 1995, Eric Burdon acquired the master tapes for this concert. His production team, under the name Risin' Sun Productions, determined that the concert was recorded at a slightly fast speed and previous releases had a correspondingly higher tone than reality. Risin' Sun corrected the defect and reproduced the concert in a number of CDs under the title "The Jimi Hendrix Experience Live at Royal Albert Hall", until the brand new Experience Hendrix label put a quash on the production. In 2006 most of the album was given away free with English newspaper the Sunday Times.
Regarding the make-believe "ultimate edition," this angers me because I frankly don't expect to still be alive in five years, as "The Other Virus" and the effects of an accident start taking their toll. So many of us who weren't even teenagers yet when he died have struggled all these years to understand why so much stuff that we know exists never came out in quality, listenable, above-ground editions.
After he died, we [Americans] had nothing. We had the four albums plus the Smash Hits package. We had the Woodstock album and Woodstock II, although the latter did not excite very many of us. Those of us who bought Crash Landing did so only because it was something -- *anything.* Jimi and Otis at Monterrey, In The West, and the Soundtrack were the first albums to come out with material we really knew: live versions of songs that had been released while he was still alive, songs that had his stamp of approval. Everything else was for hardcore fans only. We bought it because it was "at least something." Only after the CD became a cost-effective way to produce small quantities of specialized material did we start seeing what I would call a true variety of well-produced material.
I don't currently have a turntable so I can't listen to my American vinyl original, but I do have two copies of In The West on CD. If memory serves, this is the same *God Save The Queen* (etc) that I've always known. It is identical to both these older versions of the CD.