Band Of Gypsys January 28th, 1970 Madison Square Garden - NY, NY "Winter Festival For Peace" Jimi Hendrix: Guitar & vocals Billy Cox: Bass Buddy Miles: Drums & Vocals 6. Intro 7. Who Knows 8. Earth Blues This is filler on the 1/1/70 Band of Gypsys show disc 3. --Some reviews of this show-- A personal recollection from Gene Kraut. Regarding the final Band of Gyspys show at the Peace Festival at Madison Square Garden. I was there. I remember it being a very long night, particularly because I was on a disasterous first date with an unitiated to Hendrix. (In fact, I can't remember ever having a good date at a Hendrix show...perhaps no girl ever stood a chance attention-wise... I had even purchased an extra ticket for the Fillmore BOG shows but failed to ask someone. The seat was empty next to me...wise choice!) Even though there were around 10 or so acts on the bill, I assumed that to most of the audience it was going to be a Hendrix show. But by the time Hendrix came on the audience had dwindled a bit, since it was late... but there was still the air of anticipation. But it was a long build up and wait. One could only assume an annoyance factor, both on the part of the artists and the audience. Those kinds of shows were very ambitious, but because of the technical limitations back then.... most attempts at festivals in arenas would could never live up to the intended ambitions of the promoters. Ironically, the old revues ala the Murray the K spectaculars at the larger movie palaces in Brooklyn and Manhattan .... where 10 or so acts would perform 5 shows a day! were much more satisfying than the larger arena events). Anyway, when Jimi finally came on, there was obviously much confusion. My seats were on the floor, so we were fairly close to the stage... and one could see at once that something was wrong. I distinctly remember Buddy Miles looking very annoyed. Hendrix appeared completely dazed and confused and was obviously having trouble. The sound system was (as was usual at MSG shows back then) atrocious and I remember thinking it may have had something to do with that. I'm not clear on the rest... it all went so fast but I remember Jimi eventually sitting down by his Marshalls. He looked as if he might have been crying. There was more confusion on the stage and I vaguely remember Jimi being escorted off. And that was that. I couldn't make out what Jimi had said and didn't know until I had later read about it. I have no recollection of any announcements or explanations made to the audience. We left...very shaken , stoned and disappointed (I think my date was just stoned). I don't think I said a word to her on the way home. Never saw her again. Nor Jimi, for that matter. That would be the last of 8 times I had seen Hendrix perform live. I've never seen footage of this show and certainly would be interested if anyone comes up with a tape. It was one of my oddest concert experiences. Peace, Gene Kraut Stockholm -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From Chris Dixon's 30th Anniversary Series January 28, 2000, marks 30 years since the Band of Gypsys' final public appearance at Madison Square Garden in NYC. The show was an antiwar benefit billed as 'The Winter Festival For Peace' and also featured Peter Paul & Mary, Blood Sweat & Tears, Richie Havens, Judy Collins, Dave Brubeck and others. The BoG set turned out to be a very brief performance of 2 songs as Jimi was apparently too stoned and/or ill, most likely tripping in combination with other things, to continue playing by the time the (typical for the times) drastically late-running show got them onstage somewhere around 3 am. Theories have abounded ever since about Jimi's condition this night, i.e. whether he was dosed by choice, by a well meaning hanger-on, or by a manager bent on breaking up BoG. The first is contradicted by the fact that Jimi usually knew how to craft his buzz, as it were, and the latter is contradicted by the fact that Mike Jeffrey had gone to some expense to film the performance and would seem unlikely to sabotage it. Could've simply been a combination of bad timing of witting and/or unwitting ingestions, but ultimately I've no desire to pick through the extra-musical aspects of the night so let's look at the show. I've only got the audience recording for this show (a soundboard is said to exist) and it's very good for an audience tape, given the large hall and vintage production values (i.e. sound systems and tape recorders). Not exactly hi-fi but well balanced and quite listenable. (Setlist): Who Knows; Earth Blues The band is introduced by Peter Yarrow of Peter Paul & Mary, one of the event's organizers. Jimi starts by saying "Anyone want any flowers (maybe a stage decoration)?" then gives his standard rap about forgetting all that came before and building a little world in the here and now. Jimi introduces Billy and Buddy on their respective instruments and himself as "...(MAD Magazine figure) Alfred E. Newman on page 17...". Jimi's offhand humor usually a good sign but, possibly bugged by a shouted request and/or a restless audience, he takes an uncharacteristically dark turn on a longtime joke to refer to a "Foxy Lady over there with the yellow underwear...stained and dirty with blood". A warning of things to come.... The riff for 'Who Knows' starts a little slow put it picks up as Buddy enters (probably a good thing if he rushes the beat this night!). WK never got the same lyrics twice, and on this night Jimi throws in some references to the "..war is over..in your heart...", reflecting the antiwar theme of the concert. We get a first solo at 1:40. Like most of the solos this night, there's some good playing but Jimi seems to take a little longer than usual between phrases, as if struggling to gather his thoughts or stay connected, and jumps abruptly between ideas and/or sounds at times. At 3:00 he switches to some muted percussive strums followed by some lighter touch playing then improvises another vocal verse, at one point using some words familiar from the song 'Honeybed' which he'd explored with BoG the previous month ("Do I laugh, do I cry, do I live, do I die..."). At 4:30 he slips into some nice sliding octaves, then switches to some wah work before trailing off around 6:45. Buddy fills in with some scatting, then Jimi comes back more aggressively with the Octavio, hitting some nice licks and building some momentum but again trailing off, this time to end the song. This is the last known time Jimi ever plays 'Who Knows'. The audience, somewhat predictably, shouts out requests for old Experience songs. Jimi briefly plays the 'Foxy Lady' riff as if to taunt them, then starts 'Earth Blues'. This is the last known in-concert performance of EB, though it does get a workout with Mitch and Billy at the Berkeley soundcheck the following May (work on a studio version would continue, too). Jimi misses the second chord of the opening but the song settles into it's groove fairly well. The first verse and chorus go fine, with Buddy and Billy providing support vocals on the latter, but Jimi starts forgetting words in the second verse, stretching it out so they lose their place and do the chorus a few bars late, sans vocals. They do the bridge per usual and Jimi takes a solo starting at 2:15. The solo goes pretty well even if it does lack the organic flow of ideas that marked his explorations of EB at the Fillmore shows (the flow he almost always exhibited, for that matter...). At 4:30 he returns to the vocals, again improvising words and extending the verse, then does not sing at all on the chorus and bridge that follow (though Billy and Buddy do the backing vocal parts as before). At 5:50 he tries some longer flowing single string lines which works well but, again, is brief. There's one last flash of brilliance in a nice arpeggiated and embellished chord at 6:50 but it turns out to be the end of the song, Jimi stopping with the cryptic announcement "That's what happens when earth fucks with space...never forget that". Buddy and Billy continue the riff briefly but then stop, and most accounts have Jimi sitting down onstage with his head in his hands. A few random guitar strums are heard as Buddy apologizes to the crowd, telling them to give them a minute to get it together, but it's over. Jimi is said to have been helped from the stage and some accounts have him falling off of it, though unhurt. Michael Jeffreys fires Buddy after the show, maybe or maybe not at Jimi's direction but in any case this stands as the Band of Gypsys anticlimactic final performance. Only one other show, Arhus 9/70, would be cut this short because of Jimi's condition. Kind of strange that some of Jimi's finest moments (the New Years Fillmore shows) should be so directly followed by what was possibly the nadir of his career, but maybe it shouldn't be a surprise given the compressed timeline of Jimi's brightly burning time with us. Onward and decidedly upward... Chris