Jimi Hendrix Experience - Live at Maui - LP

Jimi Hendrix Experience Live In Maui presents performances made by the group on an unforgettable July 1970 afternoon.

Jimi and the Experience were promised a vacation in Maui. He knew that his manager Michael Jeffery and film director Chuck Wein were making what a cast member described as a 'cosmic surfing movie'. Jimi had been asked to supply a soundtrack to the film-an original score, as explained to him, whose music would weave in and around the footage of surfers atop Hawaii's legendary waves.

"We were to relax for a few weeks," explains Mitch Mitchell. "We then got involved in Rainbow Bridge, this crazy film that Mike Jeffery was working on in Maui. Mike and a few other people from the film came up with this idea of literally going through the streets with a truck and a few placards saying, 'Anyone one that wants to come, come up to the crater of the sun, to the volcano. We are going to have a concert.' If my memory serves me right, it was like a four-mile hike. Even if you had a car to drive on where it was, you still had one hell of a walk."

The performance itself was not advertised and tickets were not sold. Upon their arrival in Maui on July 27, 1970 with virtually no advance notice--Jimi's crew scrambled to find the necessary gear to record the performance. They sourced an eight-track tape machine from Honolulu and hauled it up the slope on a rented jeep where it was installed in a panel truck. The concert was to take place on a makeshift stage in a meadow on the lower slope, of the dormant Haleakala volcano.

On July 30, 1970, while Wein and his crew focused on trying to position the few hundred curious locals who attended the performance by their astrological signs, Jimi's crew worked furiously to mitigate the persistent wind gusts which threatened to compromise the quality of the recording. Jimi's crew were forced to cut foam from the group's instrument cases to serve as microphone wind screens. "I was used to playing on stages on fields, but never on the side of a volcano," remembers Billy Cox. "We were in the back and fixing to go onstage, Jimi said, 'This used to be a volcano, but it's no longer erupting anymore.' I said, 'I sure damn hope it doesn't erupt today!' Jimi cracked up."

Despite the chaotic surroundings, the group relished the opportunity to play in such a relaxed, informal outdoor setting. These Maui performances remain a fascinating chapter in Jimi's legacy. "All in all, it was so unique," recalls Cox. "It freed us. We just went ahead and had fun. That meant complete freedom and I think Jimi enjoyed it. It was a great concert. In fact, it was one of the greatest concerts I ever did.

John McDermott