The Jimi I Knew
For the last hour and change I have been listening to a WXPN podcast of "The Jimi You Never Knew." Being that September 18 is the anniversary of Hendrix's demise in 1970 at that tragic rock star iconic "age of death" of 27, it seemed timely to reflect on his legacy. The podcast checks in at 1 hour and 51 minutes and is a treasure trove into the his music and into those minds of the people who knew him best and worked with him closely.
I saw and heard Hendrix's Band of Gypsies drummer Buddy Miles play at the local Chameleon Club before he died in 2008 and in some way it connected me to Hendrix in a meaningful manner. Miles was still in awe of Hendrix decades later. Hendrix was prodigious in his four years of recording music and now that his Estate has regained the rights to his music, much of what was buried or shoddily bastardized and bootlegged, is now streaming out like rays of the sun through the clouds. If you dig Hendrix, this podcast from WXPN, perhaps the coolest radio station in America, is right down your alley.
Hendrix had a profound influence on my life. Even at my most Christian Fundamentalist "Purge The Past" period of throwing out rock albums and other items that reminded me of my heathen past, I never tossed this watercolor above that my older brother Mike had painted for me by one of his co-workers at the restaurant where he worked (I hardly ever listen to Christian radio anymore. It causes a rash. Quite the reversal). I knew that the Hendrix painting was a keeper and it would have been sacrilege to dispose of it. I do regret tossing the Hendrix LP Electric Ladyland and Pink Floyd's LP Wish You Were Here.
The restaurant business was stocked with dreamers who needed to pay bills (like artists). Or, dead-enders, never were, never will be types. Before working at my brother's restaurant, I worked as a dishwasher at a sleazy Tex-Mex place full of illegal aliens, teenagers, burn-outs, and hard-luckers on the kitchen staff. I befriended a black cook named Kenny who was from Boston and we shared a love for Hendrix and spent time talking about how Hendrix was not accepted by the Black community because he was a Rock and Roller with a wide and White audience. Coming from such a deep grounding in the Blues, it always interested me that Hendrix was an outsider. Being from Seattle didn't help, certainly no hotbed for Soul.
As a refrain, I am extremely thankful that I got out of the restaurant business. People get consumed by it, just like the complimentary bread and butter that establishments put on the table before ordering. At the Tex-Mex place, they served complimentary taco chips where each bowl got progressively saltier to punish the freeloaders and cause them to order more beverages. Those road salt taco chips could have been spread on slick roads to melt the icepack. I think those chips were also served at the bar from the jump. We had a raid from immigration officials and half the cooks went out the back door.
Once I had an existential conversation with an attractive waitress at my brother's restaurant where she dreamily mused on the purpose of life while I was washing some dishes (I was picking up some hours and paltry cash on Christmas Break). I had nothing for her being that I was just some dumb doofus 19 year old. Only later, much later, did I come to see that she was flirting with me. I was pretty tone deaf to the whispers of amorous interest. Unless a girl threw herself at me, which did happen once in a Blue Moon, most of the time I was so stuck in my own head to miss the signs and signals.
Not much has changed which is fine by me. I am happy single. Every so often I get pangs of regret but when I think of the responsibility of being a husband and a parent, the regret subsides. Working with Teens gives me that sense of living on in some way after I depart from the scene. I will be leaving life's station soon enough. Similarly, one of Hendrix's later tunes is a song called "I Hear My Train A' Comin." There is a wonderful rendition of it on the recent Hendrix release, People, Hell, and Angels, and it is played on the podcast.
He sings of departing from this "lonesome town." Where I grew up, we had train tracks in the backyard. Here at the townhouse, the train tracks are more distant but sometimes late at night, I hear the horn blow. It reassures me that the train is indeed coming. Christians need not fear death even though the departing from this life will be painful. I pray that Jimi is in Heaven. I sense in his music, besides the surfacey rebelliousness, a deep questioning of life. Maybe God's grace is big enough. May we meet again, for the first time.
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