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My freshman year of college, fall 1965,
one of the first things that happened
was a concert in the Student Union. I was amazed,
because it was the Isley Brothers. I was a big fan.
If you know anything about rock & roll,
or maybe I should say rhythm & blues,
the former just recently at that time
born out of the latter, and the two of them
talking to each other in a wonderful explosion—
if you remember that musical moment,
you know the Isley Brothers
for their great record "Shout," Parts I and II,
which, speaking personally, which is what I am doing,
hit my teen-aged ears like a revelation—
the wildest song I had ever heard.
And it did make me want to shout, and even now
I do shout now and then,
though mostly, in my case, it is an inner shout.
It’s still in there, though I am
at the other end of life now.
Thank God I can still be moved
by "Shout" when I hear it.
It must mean I am still alive.
The Isley Brothers had another big hit
soon after that, "Twist and Shout,"
another wonderful song.
I always liked their version
better than the Beatles’,
which came along a year or so later.
But that’s another story.
So there I was, a freshman in college,
and the Isley Brothers being there,
on stage, in person,
gave me the impression
that this place must really exist,
and also that perhaps
I was where I was supposed to be,
which was very much an open question
at that point. There they were,
Ronald, Rudolph, and O’Kelly,
singing and dancing and shouting,
and I was standing right in front of the stage.
And there was a band behind them, pumping away.
And in that band there was a guitar player,
who looked a little strange.
His hair was longer than the others’—
a straightened, straggly nest.
He was wearing a back-up band suit
like the others, but you could tell
there was something different about him.
Especially you could tell
when the Isley Brothers cut him some slack
and let him take some solos,
and he not only played, he started playing
with his teeth, and then behind his back.
The Isley Brothers were great,
they did not disappoint.
But it was pretty clear, if anything was clear,
that something else was going on with the guitar player.
At intermission I rushed back
to my dorm room, and got my Isley Brothers LP.
Things must have been more relaxed in those days,
because I had no trouble getting backstage.
I just walked through the door, and there I was,
and I walked over to the Isley Brothers
and asked them to sign my album.
Which they were pleased to do.
I remember Ronald saying, "Well, all right."
If you don’t believe
any of this I’m telling you,
I can show you the album,
with their autographs written
in blue ball point pen
across their sharp white suits.
But the thing is, on my way to the Isley Brothers,
I walked right past the guitar player,
who was leaning against the wall, smoking a cigarette.
He looked sullen, as I recall.
I could have stopped and complimented him
on his playing, asked him for his autograph,
but I didn’t. But as I like to say
when I tell this story, as I have done many times,
I was as close to Jimi Hendrix as I am to you.
It was not long after that that he hit it big,
and joined the explosion
of young musicians happening then—
group after group, album after album.
I don’t need to name them all,
but it was amazing. Yet at the same time,
we took it for granted, and felt it was ours, the brilliance….
We were, to put it mildly, a little spoiled.
Among all that burst of talent and excitement,
Jimi Hendrix stands out—don’t you think? Nobody like him.
I bought his first single, which was actually a double,
because how could you choose between "Purple Haze"
and "The Wind Cries Mary"?
The thudding primal beat of the former,
the ethereal guitar wail of the latter, so moody and mournful.
I’ve always especially liked when he would
take someone else's song, tipping his hat,
and make it wildly his own.
"All Along the Watchtower," oh, that's a good one.
"Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. "
"Wild Thing." "Johnny B. Goode"—and of course
his incredible rendition, astonishing really,
of "The Star-Spangled Banner."
Was he excessive
in his use of feedback? Maybe.
In his use of the wah-wah pedal?
No, I guess he used it just enough.
It was excessive though
when he set his guitar on fire
and kneeled over it
deliriously squirting
lighter fluid into the flames.
One should not destroy one's instrument.
It's not like I've been listening to Jimi Hendrix
non-stop for fifty years.
My box of vinyl has survived,
but it's in the attic.
Maybe one of my kids will want it.
But I heard by chance the other day
"Foxy Lady, " and it still sounded great.
So I went to the library
and got out some CDs.
"Little Wing," I'd forgotten that one,
I might never have heard it again,
which would have been too bad, wonderful song,
I was much moved by it, the way
his guitar floated and soared.
Have you heard that little coda
he put at the end of "Bold as Love" lately?
He didn't live long.
Not surprising, so much frenzy,
too much high flying, too many drugs
to mix with his virtuosity.
"Music is my religion, " he said.
No doubt many musicians have said that, or felt it,
but he had more alleluias than most, and it's a nice detail
that fate arranged, that he lived for a while
in the same house in London where Handel once lived.
From the poet’s book That Was Really Something (Groundhog Poetry Press, 2018)