Denver (Denver Pop Festival) : 29 juin 1969

Denver (Denver Pop Festival) : 29 juin 1969


Titres :

1. Tax Free
2. Hear My Train A Comin'
3. Fire
4. Spanish Castle Magic
5. Red House
6. Foxy Lady
7. Star Spangled Banner
8. Purple Haze

Source : Il existe une source "Audience" de bonne qualité selon les critères de l'époque.

Elle est en ligne est en ligne sur la page YouTube officielle :
Jimi Hendrix - Live at Denver Pop Festival 1969

C'est un concert historique : c'est le dernier du Jimi Hendrix Experience dans sa formule de départ (avec Noel Redding).


Une page entière consacrée à ce concert : http://www.bobwyman.com/hendrix.html


Source : c'est en enregistrement audience d'une très bonne qualité au regard des critères de l'époque. Le son est équilibré et laisse respirer la musicalité de la performance. A partir des deux derniers titres, la qualité décline de façon exponentielle.


29 juin 1969 : un peu plus d'une semaine après une performance sans éclat au festival de Newport, le Jimi Hendrix Experience se produit au festival de Denver pour ce qui restera son ultime performance. Peut-être en raison de la médiocrité du concert du 20 juin, je ne m'étais jamais trop attardé sur celui du 29 : à tort.


C'est avec "Tax Free" que le groupe débute le concert : c'est l'ultime version documentée de la composition du duo suédois Bo Hansson & Janne Karlsson. Le thème est prétexte à une jam permettant au groupe de se mettre en jambe.  

Les choses sérieuses commencent vraiment avec "Hear My Train A Comin'". Jimi chante particulièrement bien, avec conviction, et livre un solo d'anthologie : un long passage très intense est suivi de traits blues, où Jimi produit de superbes tirés, montrant sa maîtrise totale - et son appropriation -  des plans à la Albert King.

La version de "Fire" est assez originale : après le solo, le groupe développe un passage rythmique plus longtemps qu'à l'accoutumée. Suivent deux classiques du répertoire de l'Experience, "Spanish Castle Magic" et "Red House", sur lesquels Jimi nous livre là encore de grands solos. Avec une solide version de "Foxy Lady" dans la foulée, c'est donc 4 classiques de l'Experience rondement menés qui sont enchaînés.

La qualité de la source commence à se détériorer sur "Star Spangled Banner". On peut le regretter car après une introduction relativement timide, Jimi se lance dans un déluge sonore où son imitation des mitrailleuses nous plonge en pleine guerre du Vietnam !

L'enregistrement se termine avec "Purple Haze", dont les multiples coupures rendent l'écoute sans grand intérêt.

"Purple Haze" n'est peut-être donc pas le dernier titre joué ce jour là : Chris Dixon mentionne la possibilité d'une version de "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", ce qui n'aurait rien d'étonnant au regard des setlists de l'Experience.


Au final ? L’Experience n’a pas manqué son rendez-vous avec l’Histoire : un grand concert.

« Ouais, c'est la dernière fois que nous jouons aux States. Et comme nous l'avons dit, ç'a vraiment été beaucoup de plaisir et ainsi de suite, et ainsi de suite. Noel Redding a monté son truc qui s'appelle The Fat Matress, on les recherche. Mitch Mitchell a rassemblé un truc qui s'appelle Mind Octopus. »
— Jimi Hendrix lors du concert

Dans sa chronique publiée après le concert, James Pagliasotti précise que le Jimi Hendrix Experience a effectué une de ses "habituelles formidables performances. Hendrix tire plus de sons d'une guitare qu'on ne peut en imaginer, et les assemble tous ensemble dans une forme qui s'apparente plus au jazz qu'au rock."

Il souligne ensuite les qualités d'improvisateurs de Noel Redding et Mitch Mitchell avant de conclure que c'était "un show exceptionnel à tous égards. Il était bien organisé, avec un son excellent, le public était super et les musiciens superbes."

THE LOS ANGELES IMAGE by Gene Rogalski and R.E. Maxson:
“If last week’s festival proved anything, it proved one thing for sure: Hendrix is the unexcelled master of the electric guitar. Sunday’s program, when Hendrix was at his zenith, was the best of the three days’ shows and got the best audience response.
Included was an unprecedented two-hour jam session which may have artistically been the greatest achievement in live rock history.
Among the participants were Eric Burdon and his review, the Janis Joplin Review (without Janis), Tracy Nelson and some members of Mother Earth, and Hendrix. Janis couldn’t be missed less. Hendrix more than made up for his weak performance of Friday night. In fact, he got carried away. About twenty-five minutes before the jam ended, Buddy Miles announced, ‘We don’t want to overdo it.’ But Jimi apparently wasn’t listening - he played and played and played until (at least it’s rumoured) his plug was pulled,
This is the kind of thing you always hear about but never get to see. The participants obviously hadn’t practiced, but that can be overlooked when you’re watching some of the greatest jam together. What adjective can be applied to such a performance?
Hendrix came across with perhaps the greatest playing in all of rock’s existence, and maybe even the greatest accomplishment ever achieved with the electric guitar. He seems to know the instrument and its nearly limitless possibilities better than any electric guitarist who has ever lived.
He played for nearly the whole two hours, stopping only now and then to let other performers lay down some business - and he never repeated a riff. His creativity was aweing [God damn Yank, speak English boy!] as he switched styles from blues to jazz to rock to rhythm to whatever, all with ridiculous ease.
Hendrix was Wes Montgomery and B.B. King and Eric Clapton and you name it all wrapped up in one package of artistic fury as he demonstrated his ability to play anyone’s genre and do it better than the best practitioner of each style he attempted.
His use of the wah-wah pedal, tape loops [sic, no tape loops actually] and other relatively new features of electric guitar playing - in a way which was creative beyond belief demonstrates his thorough wisdom of the instrument and all its present-day possibilities.
There has probably never been electric guitar talent as promising as Hendrix, and if he never does anything right again his Sunday performance will stand as a great fulfilment of that talent - the man is nothing less than a genius.
The performance Hendrix wrought from his instrument dwarfed just about everything else that has gone clown, and he easily blew the considerable talent which was on the stage with him right off whenever he wanted to. The performance inspired in this writer the most compelling experience of total euphoric ecstasy ever derived from music.
Hendrix’ eye-challenging finger speed and formidable technical dexterity, his continual flow of out-of-time ideas, his peerless phrasing, his flawless sense of taste and timing, and the famous aura he communicates all molded in perhaps a once-in-a-lifetime fusion with the ultimate inspiration all musicians dream of receiving during a jam session.
It was as if Hendrix had broken through to the most profound musical dimension available to mortals and was being guided by the perfect, instantaneous teachings of improvisational composing’s most exalted spirit. Man, Hendrix was playing out of his mind.”

DENVER POST - ‘THRONG TEAR-GASSED’, Festival Flap: 33 Arrested, 6 Hurt’ by Richard O’Reilly:
‘Policemen remove a youth from gas-shrouded south end of Mile High Stadium during early moments of disturbance Sunday, A two hour melee between police and potential gate crashers of the rock music concert ended when the shows managers let the crashers in free’
”A second night of violence at the Denver Pop Festival at Mile High Stadium Sunday resulted in thousands being tear gassed, 33 arrests and 6 treated for minor injuries at Denver General Hospital.The two hour melee….potential gate crashers at the rock show concert ended only after the shows managers agreed to open the stadium. A similar disturbance erupted…day night at the…the opening night of the…”
(Page?) ‘Ruckus Outside Mars Music Inside Stadium’ – review by James Pagliasotti: “The final two nights of the Denver Pop Festival were in marked contrast to the calmness of the opening night. While a lot of good music was being laid down inside Mile High Stadium, roving bands of potential gate-crashers clashed with police outside the stadium’s south fence. Sunday night’s event saw a 2 1/2-hour battle between the police and potential gate-crashers drain much of the pleasure from the fans gathered inside Mile High Stadium. The crowd inside for the most part was well-mannered and orderly but distracted by the continual booming of tear gas cannisters and firecrackers which began shortly after a trio from San Francisco, Aum, finished a groovy opening set. The clouds of gas rose just beyond the south fence throughout performances by the Rev. Cleophus Robinson, Zephyr, and 3 Dog Night. Consequently, the audience’s attention was distracted. To say the performers bombed would be unfair, but they certainly didn’t carry the evening. The gates were finally opened to the approximately 400 people outside the stadium, and a semblance of calm was restored. The spirit of the crowd was somewhat deflated though, and a fine set by England’s Joe Cocker was only mildly received. The long-awaited Jimi Hendrix Experience put the cap on the weekend with one of their usual out-of-sight performances. Hendrix gets more sounds out of a guitar than can be imagined, and puts them all together in a form that owes more to jazz than to rock. His sidemen, Noel Redding on bass and Mitch Mitchell on drums, jam in a kind of perpetual free form accompaniment, providing as a trio what many consider to be the best group in rock music today. The final song brought the audience out onto the field, some dancing joyously, others content just to be near the Experience. Then, with feedback still droning through the amplifiers, the group ducked behind the curtains and the first Denver Festival came to an end. It was, despite outside disruptions, an outstanding show in every respect. It was well-organized, the sound was excellent, the audience was groovy, and the performers superb. Here’s hoping more of the same will follow in coming years.”

TORONTO GLOBE & MAIL - interview with Noel Redding:

Noel: “Jimi is a very good guitarist, but he was very hard to work with... I think he suffers from a split personality. He’s a genius guitarist and his writing is very good, but he whips himself. He gets every body around him very uptight because he worries about everything. God knows why... The recording sessions were chaos, and on stage it was getting ridiculous. The audience wanted us to play the old Hendrix standards, but Jimi wanted to do his new stuff.
The last straw came at the Denver Pop Festival…. when Jimi told a reporter that he was going to enlarge the band... I went up to Jimi that night [30 June, Holiday Inn, Denver] said goodbye, and caught the next plane back to London. I don’t think Jimi believed I’d do it... Actually, I don’t want you to think there’s anything nasty between Jimi and me. We’re still good friends. It’s just that we can’t work together anymore.”

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C'est bizarre, car j'ai une version bootleg de ce concert (que j'aime beaucoup) et j'ai écouté depuis, sur youtube, une version plus complète a partir du moment où la bande d'origine commence à déconner (SSB), comme si on avait réussi à lire un peu plus de la bande qui part en vrille. Je me demande de quand date le boot et de quand date cet upgrade !

Quelques images de superbe qualité (pas possible d'insérer la vidéo sur le forum) :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eh8sWgDSP9U


À noter, un passage semble confirmer la présence de "VCSR" durant le concert et qu'il existe une rumeur de captage du show par une équipe professionnelle. Sur cette vidéo on peut voir qu'il y a apparemment bien deux sources vidéos, dont l'extrait en 8 mm.

Faudrait demander à Kurt Max, qui semble apparemment avoir travailler sur la resynchronisation des extraits.

La troisième partie filmée je viens de la découvrir, film de plutôt bonne qualité voire très bonne qualité