The Jimi Hendrix Experience - Are You Experienced? (1LP, Box set, Stereo, UHQR, 33 RPM, 180g, Clear vinyl)
Sale price
€143,20
Regular price
WE CANNOT COMMIT ON A DELIVERY DATE FOR PRE-ORDER VINYL & CD/SACD
It may take a few months for Labels to issue pre-order vinyl & CD/SACD
VAT included in price for European Union countries, may be adjusted based on delivery country at check out.
Shipping is free within European Union (except for specific territories) above 99€ purchase up to 50kg. Shipping costs on quote above 50kg – quote request to be send to : contact@audiosoundmusic.com. No return policy for countries outside of European Union
ORDER LIMITED TO ONE ITEM PER CUSTOMER
Jimi Hendrix - Guitar (all tracks), Vocals (all tracks), Piano (B5) – [Click here to see more vinyl featuring Jimi Hendrix]
Noel Redding - Bass, Backing Vocals
Mitch Mitchell - Drums
Written by Jimi Hendrix except A3 written by Billy Roberts
1 LP, box set, booklet
Limited to 20,000 numbered copies
Original analog Master tape : YES
UHQR
Heavy Press : 180g Clarity Vinyl
Record color : Clear vinyl
Speed : 33RPM
Size : 12”
Stereo
Studio
Record Press : Quality Record Pressings
Label : Analogue Productions
Original Label : Track
Recorded October 23, 1966 – April 4, 1967 at De Lane Lea, CBS, & Olympic Studios, London
Engineered by Eddie Kramer
Produced by Chas Chandler
Remastered by Bernie Grundman
Originally released in May1967
Reissued in 2022
Tracks:
Side A
- Purple Haze
- Manic Depression
- Hey Joe
- Love Or Confusion
- May This Be Love
- I Don't Live Today
Side B
- The Wind Cries Mary
- Fire
- 3rd Stone From The Sun
- Foxey Lady
- Are You Experienced?
Awards:
Rolling Stone 500 Greatest Albums of All Time - Rated 30/500!
Rolling Stone 500 Greatest Songs of All Time - "The Wind Cries Mary" - Rated 379/500!
In 2000, it was voted number 63 in Colin Larkin's All Time Top 1000 Albums
1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die - ranked 107
Reviews :
“The original British pressing of Are You Experienced? (Track 612 001) was a tepid looking and sounding monophonic affair and despite the label’s name, the jacket didn’t list the tracks, nor did the front offer the band’s name.
The Who’s managers Kit Lambert and Chris Stamp had originally envisioned the Track label for their group but at the end of 1966 former Animal Chas Chandler blown away by Jimi Hendrix’s performance at New York’s Café Wha? brought him to the U.K. and his need for a record label came first.
Thus was formed Track Records—the U.K.’s first indie label— with Are You Experienced being the premier release.
Clearly the cover photo was a hastily arranged, almost goofy looking shot, and the cover was as dark and undistinguished as the hollowed-out, bass-deficient sound, recorded using 4 track recorders at Olympic, CBS and De Lane Lea studios. Great studios but Chandler was on a tight budget. Mono was then king so the mix was mono.
The back cover featured the trio’s bios and smiling shots of jazz drummer Mitch Mitchell and bassist Noel Redding who Chandler had plucked from an Animals audition. Both photos look more appropriate for a high school yearbook than for sharing space with a guy playing a Stratocaster with his teeth!
None of this prevented the album, released May 12, 1967, from becoming a huge critical and commercial U.K. success. It was of course the perfect expression of guitar-crazy freedom and psychedelic awareness craved by an about to be liberated and lifted generation.
As was the case back then in the U.K., albums did not include singles, so the record omitted “Hey Joe”, Hendrix’s first single (issued on Polydor because Track wasn’t yet up and running) “Purple Haze” and “The Wind Cries Mary”. Instead, side one opens with “May This Be Love” and ends with the title track. In between is “Remember”, an r&b riffing track not exactly a good fit with the spacey “3rd Stone From the Sun” and the searing “Fire”.
Side two opens aggressively with “Foxy Lady” then “Manic Depression” but takes a left field turn with “Red House”, admittedly a wonderfully constructed and performed blues but a momentum breaker.
Hendrix’s performance at The Monterrey Pop Festival, where in a competition with fellow Track Records artist The Who for who could produce the most stage mayhem, famously included setting his guitar on fire both figuratively and literally.
Enter Frank Sinatra’s Reprise Records, home of Sammy Davis Jr., Trini Lopez, Peter, Paul & Mary et.al and at the time not exactly a hip rock label. Reprise executives, wanting in on the “rock thing” and having witnessed Hendrix’s literally incendiary performance licensed all the music recorded for Are You Experienced.
Hendrix disappointed by the original’s bland cover art arranged for graphic artist Karl Ferris to shoot new group images, one of which became the far more striking and appropriately psychedelic Reprise cover featuring a fisheye lens distorted group portrait, wild colors and acid saturated lettering.
Eddie Kramer, who’d been involved in the original recordings, remixed and re-imagined the tracks for a “stereo” release. Since these were 4 track recordings the results were not really “stereo” but the panned presentation was perfect for the material and compared to the staid original the music jumped from the grooves, flashing like a neon sign across the soundstage, though the extreme compression applied to both make it "pop" more than the staid U.K. original and to keep the stylus from jumping from the grooves produced a flat but loud perspective. Nonetheless the American version sounded as wild and correct as the British one sounded dead in the water dull.
Unrestricted by the U.K.’s singles omissions someone produced a spectacular side 1 track order beginning with “Purple Haze” and ending with “I Don’t Live Today”. In between were “Manic Depression”, and “Hey Joe” among the six. Whew! Side two opened with “The Wind Cries Mary” and appropriately ends with “Are You Experienced?” Listeners after the first play mostly answered in the affirmative! This record was wild sonically and visually, whoever this Jimi Hendrix guy was, because at the time his history as an r&b backup guitarist wasn't known to those grabbing for records with crazy covers.
Nonetheless, before the album was released on August 23rd, 1967 the first two singles stalled on the Billboard Hot 100. “Underground stereo FM radio” was the album’s salvation and it reached #5 and charted for more than 100 weeks.
The original “Tri-color” Reprise mustard, green and pink “steamboat” label was the original soon replaced by the Warner-7Arts orange/yellow label. Those Tri-color” originals sell for $100 plus online.
Nice souvenirs but sonically they can’t touch this new Bernie Grundman mastering using the original tapes and pressed UHQR flat profile on 200g Clarity vinyl at QRP. I compared this new version to the original and to all of the other Experience Hendrix reissues and Bernie’s got them all beat in terms of dynamics, three-dimensionality and especially transparency—a quality I never thought to assign this recording but one listen will convince you that it’s there. I've been playing this record in one version or another since August of 1967 and I knew there was a "mouth pop" on "Purple Haze" but nonetheless when it came I jumped and adrenaline flowed so present and 3 dimensional was the "pop." This is one of the classic albums from the rock era and it’s never sounded this good. This version will most likely never be bettered.
Packaging is the UHQR slipcase box modeled after the original RCA Soria classical record series and if that’s a space waster for you, it’s easily stored while the laminated gatefold jacket fits nicely on the shelf along with the rest of your Hendrix collection. I'm getting emails from readers complaining that the Acoustic Sounds phone line is jammed, so best to order online. i believe Analogue Productions prepared for the response by pressing 20,000 copies before announcing the release.” Michael Fremer, AnalogPlanet, March, 2022
Lady," "Manic Depression," "Purple Haze"), instrumental freak-out jams ("Third Stone from the Sun"), blues ("Red House," "Hey Joe"), or tender, poetic compositions ("The Wind Cries Mary") that demonstrated the breadth of his songwriting talents. Not to be underestimated were the contributions of drummer Mitch Mitchell and bassist Noel Redding, who gave the music a rhythmic pulse that fused parts of rock and improvised jazz. Many of these songs are among Hendrix's very finest; it may be true that he would continue to develop at a rapid pace throughout the rest of his brief career, but he would never surpass his first LP in terms of consistently high quality.” AllMusic Review by Richie Unterberger
UHQR :
UHQR pressing is inspired from JVC Japan, which 30 years ago was the pinnacle of high-quality vinyl. Each UHQR vinyl is pressed, using hand-selected vinyl, on a manual Finebilt press with attention paid to every single detail of every single record. The 200-gram records feature the same flat profile that helped to make the original UHQR so desirable. From the lead-in groove to the run-out groove, there is no pitch to the profile, allowing your stylus to play truly perpendicular to the grooves from edge to center. Every UHQR is hand-inspected upon pressing completion, and only the truly flawless are allowed to go to market.
Ratings :
AllMusic : 5 / 5 , Discogs : 4,6 / 5
Michael Fremer : Music = 10/11, Sound = 10/11