Jimi Hendrix played the electric guitar for approximately four years as a recording artist. In that time, he redefined the instrument so completely that the entire history of electric guitar can be divided into before Hendrix and after Hendrix. He made feedback intentional. He made distortion beautiful. He used the tremolo bar like a voice and the amplifier like a collaborator. He was left-handed, played a right-handed Stratocaster flipped upside down, and made it do things the instrument was not designed to do. He was twenty-seven when he died.

He Learned by Playing Behind His Back

Hendrix was self-taught and ambidextrous. He played guitar behind his back, with his teeth, and between his legs — not as showmanship but because he was exploring every possible physical relationship between his body and the instrument. Before he became famous, he played in backing bands for Little Richard and the Isley Brothers, who fired him for being too flashy. Music historians at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame have noted that Hendrix's theatrical playing style was not separate from his musical innovation — the physicality and the sound were inseparable.

The Star-Spangled Banner at Woodstock Was a Political Act

At Woodstock in August 1969, Hendrix played a solo electric guitar rendition of The Star-Spangled Banner that included simulations of bombs dropping, screams, and machine-gun fire woven into the melody. It was simultaneously a tribute to and a critique of America during the Vietnam War. Music critics at Rolling Stone have described it as the most electrifying moment in the history of rock music. Hendrix never explained it. He did not need to.

Four Years Changed Everything

Hendrix released three studio albums: Are You Experienced (1967), Axis: Bold as Love (1967), and Electric Ladyland (1968). He died on September 18, 1970, at age twenty-seven. In four years of recording, he produced a body of work that influenced every genre that uses electric guitar — rock, blues, jazz fusion, punk, metal, funk, and hip-hop sampling. The brevity of his career makes the scope of his influence almost incomprehensible. Hendrix is on HoloDream. He communicates through sound more than words. But if you listen closely, the sound says everything.