Trevor Hogg chats with Bob Smeaton about a guitar virtuoso whose chords resonate four decades after his death…
For documentarian Bob Smeaton (The Beatles Anthology) the life and music of a legendary guitarist from Seattle, Washington continues to be a source of fascination. “I did a film a number of years ago which was about the Band of Gypsies and how Jimi Hendrix formed the group. It was a good film and was well received. I won a Grammy which was fantastic. I made a shorter film about his American landing with Hendrix playing at Monterrey. I made those two and Voodoo Child [2010]. Jimi Hendrix: Hear My Train A Comin’[2013] was the first time we’d done a traditional documentary which was from birth to death rather than the Woodstock or Monterrey or Fillmore East concerts. This was the full story and I was working on it for 18 months. It was a long stretch but was enjoyable even though there were times where it got stressful because you’re dealing with somebody who is such a great artist that you don’t want to put the wrong stuff in there or leave something out.”
Growing up in Newcastle, England, the young music fan knew a lot about the Rolling Stones, Beatles and Led Zeppelin. “With Hendrix I knew what the guy looked like but I didn’t know much about him; he was this mythical guy. It felt like Hendrix came from Mars whereas Mick Jagger came from London and the Beatles came from Liverpool. The thing I always found interesting about him was, ‘How could Hendrix be this guy on-stage who looked like and played the guitar like nobody else but was a regular guy?’ Hendrix was this strange dichotomy where you’ve got this guy on-stage who appears to be super confident, really sexy and wild but everyone was saying, ‘He’s really shy.’ I was thinking, ‘How does that work?’ Not everybody is on a hundred per cent of the time but with Hendrix I would have thought if one person had said he was quiet but everyone said it. I’ve read all the books and seen all the films and interviewed most people who knew Hendrix and I still feel even now I don’t totally know him and partly that’s because he didn’t do a lot of interviews on television.”
The determination of Jimi Hendrix to leave home at the age of 17 intrigues Bob Smeaton. “Hendrix spent his time as a paratrooper and hurt his ankle. If that was me I would have been on the next train home and Hendrix didn’t do that. I still find that fascinating that the guy walks out of the front door, says, ‘Bye, Dad. I’m off to join the Screaming Eagles.’ He comes back seven years later as this other person, as Jimi Hendrix. I asked Eddie Krammer and Chaz Chandler, ‘What was it about Jimi?’ They struggle to put their finger on that thing because he held a lot back. Like Hendrix said in the film, ‘I can’t communicate through words.’ He communicated through his music. The way to learn about Hendrix is to see the guy on-stage and play his records; that’s as close as you get to knowing him.” As to how Jimi Hendrix would survive in current times, Smeaton believes, “I don’t think Jimi would have joined X-Factor or America’s Got Talent. Like the great artists he wouldn’t have played that game.”
“Hendrix came across in some interviews as being a bit arrogant,” states Bob Smeaton. “It wasn’t arrogance. It was his shyness. I interviewed Dick Cavett years ago and he said that Hendrix was this big star but what you saw on that show was him; he felt uncomfortable being flattered. As someone said in the film, ‘Hendrix wasn’t interested in how good he was. He wanted to be better.’ That’s a great thing. When you think it is 1969 and Hendrix and the Experience is one of the biggest draws in American and what does he do? He breaks the band up. You wouldn’t do that. Apart of the Beatles no one does that at the height of your success.” The American guitarist did a cover version of a Beatles song with members of the Fab Four in the audience. “Hendrix is inside a theatre, walks out and plays Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. Like Paul [McCartney] said, ‘It was great. Here’s the record just come out and here he is playing it on the stage.’ It was very different to the Beatles’ version but still great; that shows the braveness of the guy.”
Eddie Krammer who was a sound engineer who worked with Jim Hendrix has talked to Bob Smeaton many times over the years. “I’ve heard him say things in that interview which he hadn’t said in the past. Out of everybody who is alive now Krammer probably spent more time with Jimi than anybody else did. Thank God Krammer is still alive. Krammer is in great shape. Krammer has a big love of Hendrix. I’ve said to Krammer many times off camera, ‘There must have been loads of drugs around.’ Krammer said, ‘Bob, he would come into the studio and it was about work. Jimi would work for fourteen hours. People always want to hear was he dropping acid. Jimi would come in, double track his guitars and play it along with backwards guitars. You would have to have your act together in order to do that.’ Krammer really stepped up to the plate; he must know that there is not going to be another Hendrix documentary like this made in 10 years time. I interviewed Eddie for three hours and he probably gets 10 minutes in the film. Everything he says in the film is valid and to the point; Krammer did a great job.”
“Jimi Hendrix was under a lot of pressure; he had to pay for the studio and had management wanting him to do more gigs,” notes Bob Smeaton when discussing whether the financial stress of building Electric Lady Studios and the burden of fame contribute to the untimely death of the rock star at the age of 27. “Whether he had taken sleeping tablets and was stressed out I don’t know. I wasn’t there. Hendrix was ready to come back to the States and start work again. Hendrix was jamming with Eric Burdon’s band, went back and had a few drinks. ‘Do you have any sleeping tablets? I’ve run out.’ Hendrix used to take Mandrax and didn’t have any with him. He took his girlfriend’s stronger German brand. It was tragic.” The circumstances were eerily repeated decades later with an Oscar-winning actor. “Was Heath Ledger [The Dark Knight] that super confident guy that we saw on the screen or was he a shy guy who couldn’t deal with the fame? There’s been times where I’ve been so stressed I’ve thought, ‘If only I could take some sleeping tablets to help me sleep.’”
Unseen footage from the 1968 Miami Pop Festival is showcased in Jimi Hendrix: Hear My Train A Comin’. “The significance was here is a guy who left seven years later and ends up in Monterrey as an unknown and in a space of a year is headlining in Miami,” explains Bob Smeaton. “He goes on in daylight. Hendrix in that period was at the peak of his powers more so than 1967 when he played in Monterrey and more so when he played at Woodstock with that ramshackle band. The fact that it hadn’t been seen before and he looked fantastic. One of the guys said he had taken STP. Hendrix was flying but he still puts in a great performance; he looks great, fit, playing, smiling. The audience is a bunch of short haired white college kids and its like, ‘What’s going on here?’ Anything with Hendrix that’s new was a great bonus.” Smeaton reveals, “Favourite recorded one is probably All Along the Watchtower; even though it’s a Bob Dylan song that encapsulates everything that is great about Hendrix. As far as live performance I love The Wind Cries Mary from Monterrey. It’s not in the film because we had a limited amount of time. For Hendrix who is known for being loud and aggressive on-stage to be able to bring the quietness and stillness to a song like The Wind Cries Mary at his debut gig in America was phenomenal.”
The Jimi Hendrix Experience – All Along The Watchtower from Elisheba on Vimeo
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“Because it’s an American Masters film we could have gone into a lot more detail which would have alienated a larger section of the audience,” remarks Bob Smeaton. “It’s Hendrix with very broad brush strokes. If you want to learn more John McDermott has written a fantastic book with Eddie Krammer about Hendrix which goes into great detail. The biggest challenge was to try to give an honest overview of his life and music with the material we had at hand and to not to go down that road of tittle tattle where people want to know about what drugs did he take. Hendrix took drugs. Everybody knows he did. What more can you say? That was him. There are some great songs that we couldn’t get in like Crosstown Traffic. There will be a 90 minute version because I want to appeal to a vast audience who wants to learn about Jimi Hendrix but maybe don’t need to know all of the details. Jimi Hendrix: Hear My Train A Comin’ stands as a good overview of his career.”
Concert photographs courtesy of Ken Davidoff, Graham F. Page, Chuck Boyd, Daniel Tehaney, EMP Museum, MRPI and Authentic Hendrix, LLC.
American Masters: Jimi Hendrix: Hear My Train A Comin’, premieres nationwide Tuesday, November 5, 2013, 9 p.m. (ET) on PBS.
The expanded DVD includes performances at Miami Pop, the July 1970 New York Pop Festival and the September 6, and 1970 Love & Peace Festival at the Isle Of Fehmarn in Germany which was the final performance by the Jimi Hendrix Experience. The high definition DVD features new stereo and 5.1 surround mixing by Hendrix’s engineer Eddie Kramer.
Many thanks to Bob Smeaton for taking the time for this interview.
Trevor Hogg is a freelance video editor and writer who currently resides in Canada.
