When “Band of Gypsys” released, I still was not yet a teenager (I was 11), but I remember being confused and a bit disappointed in the album. Up to this time, Jimi Hendrix had released three stunning works of genius with the Experience that impressed not just me, but also the entire world.

As a kid, I couldn’t afford to buy a lot of albums, so I knew Hendrix’s work from the collections of my friends’ older brothers, and to my mind “Band of Gypsys” lacked the spark of his previous work. At the time, I blamed Buddy Miles for my disillusion. Some of my friends were grooving on “Changes” but I thought it sounded too stiff, lacking the loose fluidity that made Hendrix seem like the coolest human being on the planet. The problem was that I let that impression affect my opinion of the entire album, which was a mistake.

Side one is brilliant, especially the extended blues power of “Machine Gun.” To this day, I still have issues with Buddy Miles, but hey, it was a new Hendrix album, and as it turns out, is was also the last album he made before his untimely death. It may not be perfect, but the highlights dominate.

Featured tracks include:

Who Knows

Machine Gun

Changes

Power to Love

Message of Love

We Gotta Live Together

March 1970 - Billboard Charted #5