Jimi Hendrix - First Rays of the New Rising Sun (upgrade)

Jimi Hendrix & The Cry of Love – 

First Rays of the New Rising Sun

(soniclovenoize reconstruction)

Nov 2014 UPGRADE

Side A:

1. Dolly Dagger
2. Night Bird Flying
3. Room Full of Mirrors
4. Belly Button Window

5. Freedom

Side B:

6. Ezy Ryder
7. Astro Man
8. Drifting
9. Straight Ahead

Side C:

10. Earth Blues

11. Izabella
12. Drifter’s Escape
13. Beginnings
14. Angel

Side D:

15. Stepping Stone
16. Bleeding Heart
17. New Rising Sun (Hey Baby)
18. In From The Storm

Happy Halloween!  This is an UPGRADE to my reconstruction of Jimi Hendrix’s final album before he passed away, First Rays of the New Rising Sun.  Hendrix had spent the final year of his life—and especially the final months—working on what would-have-been a double-album follow-up to Electric Ladyland.  Instead of assembling the album as Hendrix had envisioned, the material was dashed together by producer Alan Douglas and released on a number of posthumous albums, including The Cry of Love, Rainbow Bridge, War Heroes, Loose Ends and Voodoo Soup.  After securing the legal rights to his catalog, a separate attempt was made by The Hendrix Estate in 1997 to re-issue a compilation meant to replicate Hendrix’s wishes for First Rays, but many fans noted that poor song selection and mastering missed the mark as well.  My reconstruction attempts to gather all of Jimi Hendrix’s own final mixes of the most completed tracks when possible (13 out of 18 songs), ignoring posthumous mixes.  Also  the sources featuring the best mastering and highest dynamics are used to correct what both Douglas and The Hendrix Estate could not, and present a more accurate representation of what Hendrix desired for his swansong and come-back album. 

The upgrades to this Nov 2014 edition are:

• “Dolly Dagger”, “Room Full of Mirrors” and “Hey Baby” are all taken from the new 2014 Experience Hendrix remaster of Rainbow Bridge, the very best source for the songs
• “Night Bird Flying”, “Belly Button Window”, “Freedom”, “Ezy Ryder”, “Astro Man”, “Drifting”, “Straight Ahead” and “Angel” are all taken from the new 2014 Experience Hendrix remaster of The Cry of Love, the very best source for these songs
• The actual vintage Jimi Hendrix mix of “Earth Blues” from the Purple Box is used here, replacing the posthumous mix found on Rainbow Bridge
• The actual vintage Jimi Hendrix mix of “Drifter’s Escape” from South Saturn Delta is used here, replacing the posthumous mix found on Loose Ends
• The actual vintage Jimi Hendrix mixes of “Stepping Stone” and “Izabella” from a needledrop of their single is used here, replacing the posthumous mix found on War Heroes. 
• The actual vintage Jimi Hendrix mix of “In From The Storm” from West Cost Seattle Boy is used here, replacing the posthumous mix found on Cry of Love
• An original artwork collage reproducing a sketch made by Hendrix the day before his death, thought to be his actual cover art concept for the First Rays of the New Rising Sun. 
• "Izabella" was moved up to the second song on Side C, so that it closes with “Angel” as per Jimi’s handwritten tracklist. 

1969 was the year of metaphorical death and rebirth for Jimi Hendrix.  After dissolving his chart-topping power trio The Jimi Hendrix Experience and it’s following brief incarnation Gypsy Sun and Rainbows (who backed him at Woodstock), Hendrix was under pressure by Civil Rights activists to form an all-black band.  His answer was Band of Gypsies, featuring bassist Billy Cox (who had played in Gypsy Sun and Rainbows) and drummer Buddy Miles.  The trio set out to rehearse all-new Hendrix originals to fulfill a contractual loophole in which Hendrix owed producer Ed Chalpin an album’s worth of new material; the result was the live album Band of Gypsies, which showcased more structured songs with a funk and R&B-influenced sound, of course infused with Hendrix’s own penchant for psychedelia and guitar wizardry.   A studio single “Stepping Stone” b/w “Izabella” was also released at this time, before being quickly withdrawn due to Hendrix’s dissatisfaction with the mix.  Although the band dissolved in January 1970, Hendrix had written a vast amount of new material with the trio and had secretly set aside what he deemed the best material from the live Band of Gypsies album for his fourth proper studio album, what he was now announcing to the press as First Rays of The New Rising Sun.

Hendrix quickly reformed a new backing band, this time featuring the winning combination of Experience drummer Mitch Mitchell and Band of Gypsies bassist Billy Cox (who were the core rhythm section of Gypsy Sun and Rainbows), called The Cry of Love (although billed as The Jimi Hendrix Experience for commercial reasons).  Recording sessions commenced at The Record Plant from January to May; while touring that spring, Hendrix compiled a list of 24 songs to be considered for the album (at that point called Straight Ahead), all in various forms of studio completion (as shown by checks or Xs) from the Record Plant sessions.  After the first leg of their American tour, the trio returned off and on to Hendrix’s own Electric Ladyland Studios in June and July, recording more basic tracks as well as new work on the withdrawn Band of Gypsies single, “Stepping Stone” and “Izabella”.  By this point, Straight Ahead had reverted to its original title First Rays of the New Rising Sun, and had been described as an intended double-album by Hendrix’s inner circle. 

In late August, Hendrix and producer Eddie Kramer added overdubs and prepared mixes of several songs for the album, although we can never be sure if they were truly the final mixes, as Hendrix tended to add subtle touches to every song right up until their final release.   Regardless, tracks mixed by Hendrix at this time include: “Room Full of Mirrors”, “Ezy Ryder”, “Earth Blues”, “Night Bird Flying”, “Straight Ahead”, “Drifter’s Escape”, “Astro Man”, “Freedom”, “Dolly Dagger”, “In From The Storm” and curiously a solo demo version of “Belly Button Window.”  Of these, both “Dolly Dagger” and “Night Bird Flying” were approved as final, finished mixes and were dashed off to be mastered for a single release.  At this session it is believed that Hendrix began creating a tracklist for First Rays of the New Rising Sun, scrawled on the back of a 3M tapebox.  While Sides A and B seemed fairly definite, Side C had several titles scratched out or in parenthesis; Side D was left blank. 

Hendrix and The Cry of Love jaunted off for their ill-fated European Tour, beginning with the Isle of Wight Festival on August 30th.  As September rolled on, the shows were met with jeering and Hendrix’s spirits were visibly diminished.  Taking a week off in London, a paranoid Billy Cox apparently quit the group and headed home.  Spending his final days with figure skater Monika Dannemann, Hendrix created an illustration featuring his face as well as famous White, Black, Asian and Native American faces in the shape of cross which some believe to be a cover concept for First Rays of the New Rising Sun.  Hendrix was found dead the next day. 

Most of the completed material for First Rays was gathered together and assembled into the first of many posthumous Hendrix releases, The Cry of Love, released in 1971.  Coupled with many of Hendrix’s own working mixes from August 22-25^th, additional recording was done to “Angel” and “Drifting” to make them release-worthy.  More tracks were mixed posthumously and appeared on the Rainbow Bridge soundtrack in 1972 with the bottom of the barrel scraped for War Heroes in 1973 and Loose Ends in 1974.  Producer Alan Douglas attempted to recreate a First Rays-like reconstruction in 1995 as Voodoo Soup, which blasphemously featured contemporary overdubs!  After gaining control of his catalog, The Hendrix Estate issued their own reconstruction of First Rays in 1997, perhaps the closest yet, but still missing a few key components.  Here we will try to set the record straight (ahead).

Luckily, our work is cut out for us as Hendrix himself had already decided on a track order for disc 1, as per his list scrawled on the back of a 3M tape box (which is included for your reference); our work is half done!  Opening Side A is “Dolly Dagger” from the amazing 2014 remaster of Rainbow Bridge.  Following is “Night Bird Flying” from the equally amazing 2014 remaster of Cry of Love.  While this title also was scrawled in as opening side C, it is written in boldface as the second track on side B, suggesting it was a later and more definite revision, and is thus used here.  “Room Full of Mirrors”, again from Rainbow Bridge is next, followed by Hendrix’s solo demo of “Belly Botton Window” from Cry of Love. While many don’t believe this drastic dynamic shift would have been on the album, I think it’s a rather welcomed change in the side’s flow, and we’ll stick to Jimi’s wishes.  The side closes with “Freedom” from Cry of Love.  Side B opens with “Ezy Rider”, followed by “Astro Man”, “Drifting” and “Straight Ahead”, all also taken from Cry of Love.  Many fans question Jimi’s tracklist here, as side B is much shorter than A, running four songs at 16 minutes compared to five songs at 19 minutes.  While that may be true, I will stand by Jimi’s choice here as what he intended, and furthermore I feel that despite its length, it sounds like a fairly complete side.  This is apparently what Hendrix wanted for First Rays: a concise album, no sprawling instrumental experiments, just all killer and no filler. 

With disc 1 complete, we are left to create the second disc Jimi never got around to.  The method for my disc two reconstruction is simple: use the remaining complete (or mostly complete) tracks to make a second disc that is as comparable as possible to the first: straight-forward funk/R&B, running nine songs at 35 minutes with the fourth side shorter than the third.  We will drop some songs that are too skeletal (“Cherokee Mist”), others that do not feature the funky R&B sound of disc one (“Come Down Hard On Me”) as well as instrumentals that would not have made the cut anyways (“Pali Gap”).  For the case of side C, we will open it with an upbeat soul-rocker, as side A did: with “Earth Blues”, using Jimi’s own vintage mix found on the Purple Box, as opposed to the posthumous mix on Rainbow Bridge.  Next is “Izabella”, portraying the equivalent of “Night Bird Flying”, using Hendrix’s own original vintage mix found on the Band of Gypsies 7” (a rare mix that is exclusive only to that release).  Following is the more aggressive rocker, the part played by “Drifter’s Escape”, again using Hendrix’s own mix found on South Saturn Delta.  The idiosyncratic dynamic shift is next with “Beginnings” taken from a vinyl rip of Loose Ends; although we are avoiding instrumentals, it is included because not only does it fit the sound of the album, but it was written in as a contender for side C by Hendrix.  The side also closes as per his wishes, with “Angel” taken from The Cry of Love. 

Side D opens much like B, with the dense, heavy guitar fury of “Stepping Stone”, again using the extremely rare vintage Hendrix mix found on the Band of Gypsies 7” as opposed to the posthumous mix on War Heroes.  The side's bouncy rocker follows with “Bleeding Heart”, taken from War Heroes, and then the mid-tempo epic “Hey Baby (New Rising Sun)” taken from Rainbow Bridge.  Much like the previous disc, the album ends with a mid-tempo groove-rocker “In From The Storm”, here using Hendrix’s own vintage mix from West Cost Seattle Boy as opposed to the posthumous mix found on The Cry of Love.  In the end, we have a second nine-song, 35-minute disc that matches the first.  The final touch is my own collage reproduction of the sketch Hendrix made the day before his death, possibly his actual cover art idea: Hendrix’s own face in the center of a cross; with Martin Luther King Jr and an African queen on the left arm (representing blacks); John F Kennedy and Adolph Hitler on the right arm (representing whites); Buddha and Genghis Khan in the top arm (representing Asians); Cochise, Crazy Horse and Geronimo on the bottom arm (representing Native Americans).  While I have no idea why Hitler is right next to JFK, we will accommodate Hendrix's own concept; please excuse any perceived audacity.  This, coupled with the two discs of this set, seem to be the first rays of what could have been Jimi’s last rising sun. 

Sources used:

The Cry of Love (2014 Experience Hendrix CD remaster)

The Jimi Hendrix Experience (2000 CD box set)

Rainbow Bridge (2014 Experience Hendrix CD remaster)

South Saturn Delta (1997 CD)

Stepping Stone/Izabella 7” (1970 US vinyl, rip by professor stoned)

War Heroes (1971 German vinyl pressing, rip by vinylhound)

West Coast Seattle Boy (2010 CD box set)

flac --> wav --> editing in Audacity and Goldwave --> flac encoding via TLH lv8

* md5 files, track notes and artwork included

Jimi Hendrix - First Rays of The New Rising Sun

Jimi Hendrix - First Rays of The New Rising Sun

(soniclovenoize reconstruction)

AS OF NOVEMBER 2014, THIS MIX RECONSTRUCTION WAS UPDATED
GO HERE FOR THAT

Side A:

1. Dolly Dagger
2. Night Bird Flying
3. Room Full of Mirrors
4. Belly Button Window
5. Freedom

Side B:

6. Ezy Ryder
7. Astro Man
8. Drifting
9. Straight Ahead

Side C:

10. Earth Blues
11. Drifter’s Escape
12. Beginnings
13. Angel
14. Izabella

Side D:

15. Stepping Stone
16. Bleeding Heart
17. Hey Baby (The New Rising Sun)
18. In From The Storm

From November 1969 to August 1970, Jimi Hendrix set out to record the follow-up to his psychedelic odyssey Electric Ladyland.  At first utilizing his Band of Gypsies line-up of bassist Billy Cox and drummer Buddy Miles, Mitch Mitchell was later brought back behind the kit and the trio recorded an abundance of material in various states of completion over those 10 months.  The songs had a decidingly funkier tone than Hendrix’s previous psychedelic and hard rock explorations, and were heavily influenced by R&B and soul as well as heavy psyche-rock.  Jimi Hendrix’s fourth studio album was to be a double-LP, called First Rays of The New Rising Sun.

Unfortunately that never happened as Hendrix passed away in September 1970, leaving the album half-finished.  After gaining control of Hendrix’s catalog, producer Alan Douglas gathered the unfinished tracks and released them posthumously, sprinkled across a number of bastardized Hendrix releases over the next few years.  The majority of the tracks were released on 1971’s The Cry of Love, with a few more that year on Rainbow Bridge, War Heroes and Loose Ends in 1974.  And there the songs remained, uncollected as the final masterpiece he had originally intended.  That is until 1997 when The Hendrix Estate gained control of the original master recordings and compiled the material as their take on Jimi’s unreleased masterpiece First Rays of The New Rising Sun.  But through improper song choice and sequencing, terrible brickwalled and clipping mastering and cheesy Photoshop cover art, Hendrix aficionados pointed out that the album still missed the mark, even under the guise of being official. 

This is an attempt to recreate what would be Jimi Hendrix’s final album, First Rays of The New Rising Sun.  The track sequencing and song selection follows closer to what is believed Hendrix intended, and attempts to be true to his artistic vision in 1970 based on recording histories, interviews and handwritten tracklists.  Also, all tracks are taken from alternate sources to avoid the clipping, over-compressed mastering found on the 1997 official release, using mostly vinyl rips of original 1971 pressings.  All tracks are tightly crossfaded into four continuous sides of music, as Hendrix might have had intended.

Sources used:

The Cry of Love (1971 German vinyl pressing, rip by vinylhound)

War Heroes (1971 German vinyl pressing, rip by vinylhound)

Rainbow Bridge (1971 US pressing, rip by tubert)

Loose Ends (1989 Japanese CD pressing)

flac --> wav --> editing in Audacity and Goldwave --> flac encoding via TLH lv8

* md5 files, track notes and artwork included

Album construction notes:

How do we know what would have been on First Rays of The New Rising Sun?  Realistically, we don’t.  But there are a number of clues which Jimi has left us, in which we can make a very educated guess. 

First off, a note about the sources used:  One of the disheartening points of the 1997 release of First Rays of The New Rising Sun was the over-the-top, super-compressed mastering, in which all tracks clip numerous times throughout the song, hiding certain frequencies and decreasing the dynamics overall.  All sources on my reconstruction are from high-quality transfers of the original vinyl pressings.  In comparison, these mixes are cleaner and more pristine than the modern CD release, vinylhound’s rips being extraordinarily excellent.  The only exception is “Drifter’s Escape”, as I found the soundquality of the vinyl version extremely muddy (a characteristic of the album itself).  Instead I used the original CD version taken from the Japanese pressing of the album in 1989, which was possibly remixed.  The sonics of that version more closely matched that of the pristine rips of the rest of the songs, making my construction sound more unified.

The first clues to reconstructing First Rays of The New Rising Sun are a handwritten list of 24 song contenders for the album (included with this torrent for reference).  Next is a handwritten tracklist on the back of a 3M tapebox (also included in this torrent) which maps out the tentative track orders for the first three sides of the album.  While Side C was obviously uncertain and in a state of flux, Sides A and B seemed to be finalized.  Jimi had already decided on the running order of the first disc himself!  Our job is already half done!

A closer look at Jimi’s tracklist for disc one should tell us a lot about what disc two would have been like: both sides start and end with an uptempo rocker (“Dolly Dagger” and “Ezy Ryder”).  Both sides also close with an uptempo rocker (“Freedom” and “Straight Ahead”) Also, there is one of the more idiosyncratic songs in the middle (the bluesy, stripped down “Belly Button Window” and the atmospheric ballad “Drifting”).  The second track on each side was also an uptempo groove-rocker, but could be characterized as slightly more experimental in design, as sort of continuing the energy level of the openers, but allowing room for the side to grow (“Night Bird Flying” on Side A and “Astro Man” on Side B).  Many frown upon “Belly Button Window”’s early placement on Hendrix’s sequence, but I feel it’s an interesting diversion from the pace of the album, a function “Drifting” also utilizes and a pattern I’ll repeat on Sides C and D. 

It has been much debated about the length of Side B—was it supposed to be only 4 songs, running about 16 minutes?  Isn’t that a little short?  I am under the belief that it is NOT too short, that this is what Hendrix intended.  When listening to Side B, one still gets the impression of the complete side of an album, with “Straight Ahead” giving closure to disc 1.  Also a short, 16-minute side was not uncommon at the time, and the total length of disc one is thus approximately 35 minutes.  In summary, disc 1 was very straight forward in design, and one can postulate disc 2’s construction based on these parameters, creating a second 9-song, 35-minute disc.

The second step is to narrow down the list of contenders for disc 2.  The remaining tracks that are available that Hendrix was perfecting the summer of his death (and are in a some-what commercially releasable status) are: Angel, Beginnings, Bleeding Heart, Cherokee Mist, Come Down Hard On Me, Drifter’s Escape, Earth Blues, Hey Baby, In From The Storm, Izabella, Lover Man, Midnight Lightning, Stepping Stone and Valleys of Neptune (note that My Friends is excluded because it was never a contender for the album, not even recorded during the First Rays sessions).  Of those 14, we would only need 9 to match the first disc, and it is quite easy to narrow the list down.  When listening to the first disc, one can easily hear the unified musical direction Hendrix was aiming for, and it is obvious which of these 13 tracks would easily fit in based on the funky musical elements rather than a blues-based element (including percussive overdubs, backing vocals and psychedelic mixing characteristics).  When examining the sonic design, these tracks match disc one and are also the most “complete” songs of an album that was never completed anyways: Angel, Bleeding Heart, Drifter’s Escape, Earth Blues, In From The Storm, Izabella and Stepping Stone.  These seven should be fitted onto disc 2, leaving two more to choose from the remaining bluesy “skeletal” batch of songs. 

Choosing two from the remaining seven “skeletal” songs was for me an easy choice, but admittedly comes down to personal preference.  One could not have First Rays of The New Rising Sun without its title track, so “Hey Baby” is chosen.  Of the remaining six (Beginnings, Cherokee Mist, Come Down Hard On Me, Lover Man, Midnight Lightning and Valleys of Neptune), Beginnings seems to be the most refined and release-ready and musically equivalent to the other 17.  Perhaps more than coincidentally, both songs were among the original 1971-released songs.  When added up, these 9 songs approximate 35 minutes—remarkably matching disc one!  All that is left is to determine the track order. 

When constructing Side C, we must examine Hendrix’s notes.  This third side did not seem finalized, as half the songs were crossed out, and two of them were too skeletal and did not even make my cut!  Furthermore, if you assembled a side matching Hendrix’s rough, scratched out list, the result is a side that is too long and musically ununified, much unlike the previous two sides.  Although, we do know that “Drifter’s Escape”, “Beginnings” and “Angel” will belong on this side so we reserve space on Side C for all three.  If we look at the remaining 6 songs, the best contender for an opener for the second disc would be the hard-rocker “Earth Blues”.  It is then followed by the ‘second-track’ experimental-groover, which is “Drifter’s Escape” (which Hendrix had slated also).  The only instrumental on the entire album, “Beginnings” is fitted into the middle of the Side C as a sort of middle-point interlude, a type of intermission if you will.  My mix hard-edits the intro into the end of “Drifter’s Escape”.  This is followed by the token ‘idiosyncratic’ song in the middle of a side (much like “Belly Button Window” and “Drifting”), the unearthly ballad “Angel”.  Although Hendrix had penciled in “Angel” to close Side C, I chose to follow the precedent of the first two sides and close the Side C with the uptempo rocker, “Izabella”.  This song had been a blemish with many First Ray historians, as it was difficult to find an appropriate place for the song.  But when crossfaded into the closing bass-run of “Angel”—descending to D major, the same key as “Izabella”--the choice is obvious.  We are left with a solid 18:45 five-song side, comparable to Hendrix’s Side A. 

We have 4 songs remaining to occupy side D, making a perfect fit: “Stepping Stone” acts as the side-opening rocker, “Bleeding Heart” acts as the second-track experimental-groover; “Hey Baby” acts as the mid-side idiosyncratic track; and “In From The Storm” acts as the epic side-closer.   Just as Side B, we have a shorter 4-song side that totals exactly 17-minutes.  Not too shabby!  In the end we have a two-disc set, each with approximately 35-minutes worth of music.  The songs are unified and cohesive and flow together perfectly.  Lastly, I included an original watercolor by Jimi Hendrix himself for the cover art, the original version of what was later used on the Valleys of Neptune compilation.   I felt the original more appropriate with this collection.  Enjoy!

-soniclovenoize, June 2012