Interview par Jim Brodey pour "The San Diego Free Press" : Samedi 24 Mai 1969

James Marshall Hendrix, completing a two-month concert tour of the U.S., gave the Free Press an exclusive interview last week. Jimi, who was recently busted in Toronto for "illegally possessing narcotics", goes to trial in a couple of weeks. The Canadian bust was made at the airport by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who searched his luggage and discovered several small packages in a small bottle. Circumstances leading to the arrest could indicate a frame. The New Musical Express had reported that Jimi was going into retirement for a year. This and the bust were among some of the topics discussed in a small dressing room at the rear of the Sports Arena prior to his performance.

JH: I can't tell you too much about that because my lawyer told me not to. Anyway, I'm innocent, completely innocent.
JB: Do you think it was a frame?
JH: It must have been or either it was just a very bad scene, because it ain't anything it was. But, anyway, I can't talk too much about it now.
JB: How about your retirement? I understand you're going to...
JH: Oh well, see this is what the negative folks are trying to tell you. That's what the establishment is telling you. They're trying to blow us all up and give us awards and all that so that they can just dust us away, but we're not here to collect awards, you know, we're here to turn people on to the right way because there is some really strange scenes coming up though... Hey I can't do this with other people in the room.
JB: You mean the rumor then about your going into a year's retirement. .
JH: No, I don't think it'll take that long actually because now is the time when a year's retirement would be just completely wasted, you know, at the rate our pace is going now.
JB: What objective do you have? Just sort of to get back together again?
JH: No, no, not again. There's other moves I have to make now, you know. A little more towards a spiritual level through music. It's not that the idea of basing yourself on different religions and so forth. There's no such thing really. All those are nothing but games they play upon themselves, but you know the drag of it is there are a lot of good people that are aware of the games being played. They play just as many but are not doing anything about it, you know, for their own selves. Not necessarily taking violent means; that's just another game. That's what they want you to do. They want you to be extra weak; fight amongst yourselves--so they can have complete control, you know...
Some of the vibrations people claim they are getting now, it is true considering the fact that the earth is going through a very, what do you call it, physical change soon. A physical change basically. I mean like since the people are part of Earth, they are going to feel it too. In many ways they are a lot of the reason for causing it
There really are other people in the solar system, you know, and they have the same feelings too, not necessarily bad feelings, but see, it upsets their way of living for instances, and they are a whole lot heavier than we are. And it's no war game because they all keep the same place. But like the solar system is going through a change soon and it's going to effect the Earth in about 30 years, you know. And I'm not talking about just this room; I'm talking about the Earth itself. This room is just a crumb from the crust of the pie. And like there's no moving from any one land to another to save your self in that respect.
So I think a person should try to get his own thing because he should get a certain faith with one link. There's no whole lot of religions. Just one link because there's only a few chosen--people that supposedly are to get this across; these chosen people, in the process, are now being distracted and they are drowning themselves. So, therefore, they've got to take a rest. Not a rest, but a break from people. In order to properly save them, they've got to take a break from people. There's no good people or bad people, it's actually all lost and found. That's what it all boils down to. There's a lot of lost people around and like there are only leaders in times of crises, but that's what's happening now. It's not just a fad that's going on; it's very serious.
If you revert back in time, there's Egypt. It's very dusty now, but it used to be green. It's that they had a great flood and the world used to be flat, so they say, I mean, you know. And like they found memorandums on the moon, but no telling when they are going to get there, but when they do, they are going to find memorandums from other civilizations that have been there before and think nothing of it because the moon is there in the first place.
I mean, it's hard to say really quickly, but all they can do… the only answer they can find is through music now. That's not a good scene or a bad scene, this is the truth. They have to face up to the complete, constant truth. Music is in a state now where it's getting rid of all the rubbish, and in order to do these things, mostly the musicians that are here for a purpose are not out to satisfy themselves because in that case, that is when they get distracted with the fame, imagery, and all that stuff. Actually this is when the kids get more distracted by trying to follow the changes that a musician might go through because they look like that person. Like when they come here to see us, which is wrong. That is what we are trying to get across. It's very easy right now because, like I say, I haven't had this time to get away yet.
JB: Will it actually be an absence from the rock scene then?
JH: I don't look at things like the rock scene and folk scene. I don't look at those terms at all. But, therefore, nothing can explain what I'm going to do later on. I will have to use some sort of brand name. So like, I guess I will call it the spiritual scene. But it's not a hazy thing out of frustration or bitterness that I'm trying to build up. It's out of what's directing me. What I was here in the first place to do. It does mean I am going to strip myself from my identity because this isn't my only identity. I was foolish to cut my hair, but that was part of the step of me learning what I was really here for. I see miracles every day now. I used to be aware of them maybe once or twice a week, but some are so drastic that I couldn't explain them to a person or I'd probably be locked up by this time.
JB: Through what means do you see these miracles?
JH: From all different types because you may not
JB: It might be used as a vehicle. . .
JH: Yeah, I would like to say to close, there are a few chosen people that are here to help to get these people out of this certain sleepiness that they are in. There are some people running around with long hair preaching the word "love," and they don't know what the fuck they are talking about because there's no such thing as love until truth and understanding come about. All they're doing is making themselves weaker and weaker until their negatives come and just take them away. And that's what's gonna' happen. Then you are going to have no world to live on. The establishment's going to crumble anyway. This only happens when a person has his own thing. If he is a carpenter, for instance, or whatever, he has to work towards what he really digs. Like someone is going to have to go back to his childhood and think about what they really felt, really wanted before the fingerprints of their fathers and mothers got a hold of them or before before the smudges of school or progress... Most of them are sheep. Which isn't a bad idea. This is the truth, isn't it? That's why we have some sheep fighting under the form of Black Panthers and some sheep under the Klu Klux Klan. They are all sheep and in the beginning they were all following a certain path.
JB: But you feel the Black Panthers are necessary, though?
JH: Yea, only to the work "necessary." You know, in the back of their minds they should be working towards their own thing. They should be a symbol only to the establishment's eyes. It should only be a legendary thing.
JB: Is it necessary as a step on the road to liberation and freedom?
JH: It all depends on what freedom means. Some people don't even know the meaning.
JB: How about for each individual that's involved in the Black Panthers?
JH: No, see, most of that comes from any kind of aggressive group like that. It's good when you start adding up universal thoughts, and it's good for that second. The rest of it should probably be in a legendary figure. In a, what do you call it, a symbol, or whatever. So what they are doing now is fighting amongst their individual selves. There's nothing we can explain to them. Most of it is from bitterness. There's no color part now. There's no black and white. It's very small. It's just like animals fighting amongst each other--then the big animals will come and take it all away.
JB: But someone who has been crippled for years?
JH: Other people have no legs, have fought in wars and have no eyesight.
JB: Psychologically crippled
JH: Right, that's what it's all about. They have to relax and wait to go by feeling. If you are going to be psychological, you have to go by the psychological feeling. If you start thinking negative, it switches to bitterness, aggression, hatred, whatever.
At this point the interview was interrupted by promoters and someone with a "love" medallion. Top forty radio station KCBQ (Ed., KCBQ has since changed it's format to an all talk radio station.), had sponsored a contest in which entrants who had made the "grooviest love" medallion would win a free ticket to the concert and present their love beads to Hendrix in person. Jimi, who knew nothing of the contest, refused to save face for the bumbling KCBQ and wouldn't see the winners.

Later that evening at the cocktail lounge at the Hilton Inn, Hendrix further discussed his philosophies of life. The lounge seemed symbolic of everything within the establishment which Hendrix was so against. Perhaps Jimi's view of life may be different from ours; certainly in his position he sees a different view. Fame, money and success can put strange emotions into one's head and Hendrix does fall into this category. He is part of the game, surely. But I doubt he is the leader he thinks he is; I doubt that music is as powerful a force as he would have us believe. What happens to the Experience now doesn't look certain. The possibility of personnel changes isn't unlikely. A new album will be released before the end of summer and before the "retirement" happens. Live material will be used on the album. (Saturday's concert was recorded, but most likely won't be used.)”