Are You Experienced?: The Inside Story of the Jimi Hendrix Experience

I put off reading this for years due to hearing from friends who were turned off by the problems the late Noel Redding had getting paid for his contributions to the music of the Experience band. It was worth the read and is a good companion piece to Mitch Mitchell's book about his Experience years. As mentioned in other reviews the writing isn't the best and the last third of the book does go into mind numbing detail of how he was denied royalties on music he helped create that appeared on the 3 albums of JHE. Noel is pretty honest about his over the top self medicating abuse but there is also there is some humor here in the life of a musican starting out. Some fascinating observations from someone who was there, such as his opinion that as much as everyone loved Jimi Hendrixes guitar playing; it was his intimate talk/singing vocal work that created an atmosphere that really drew people in. Noel probably weighed not a whole lot over 125 pounds and had a somewhat quiet and nasal singing and talking style, but here's a guy that took a bus to an audition as a very young man and was soon touring the world with 2 of the top musicians of the era and holding his own on bass with a dirty driving tone and plenty of inventive ideas of his own . If you like the intro to the song The Burning Of The Midnight Lamp, the title of the song Midnight Lightning or the guitar introduction to the song Freedom , they are just a few of the examples of the many things Noel brought to the party and did not receive credit for. Noels comments that it was the 3rd tour that finished the JHE group off explain why the 2 shows I saw them do in 1968 were unfortunately just not that memorable musically although the first one was exciting. Plus it was way better than going to the high school homecoming dance the same night

Although this is indeed not a particularly well written book, (and I thought Jessica's review was hilarious), you have to bear in mind that Noel was a bass player, not a writer. This is Noel's story and pretty essential reading for any Hendrix fan. Noel clearly, dearly loved Jimi and understood him well and had a good perspective and balance on his character, and events that happened. But obviously he had his opinon. What struck me most is that it's a real eye opener as to what being a successful musician is like. I also think any budding musician should read this-so they can find out exactly what they're letting themselves in for. It is so easy to imagine the life of a successful musician as glamourous when it's far from it. Even after The Experience were famous they were still going to gigs sitting in the back of a van on the top of the equipment, with their heads banging on the ceiling. Not the fur coat and limo people would perhaps envisage. Although it goes to show that despite no sleep, no time off, no money, and barely the chance of a decent meal, at least a man that looked like "Bob Dylan's grandmother" as Jimi called him, could get more action than Frank Sinatra probably ever did. Yes, it's full of these boring detailed lists that Redding liked to make of various expenses, but despite this it's still a very entertaining book and the man has a great sense of humour. It's very unfair that Noel never got his money, but if you read this you can see in the end he had what money could never buy-real friends away from the sharks of the music industry, and the love and support of his family. I personaly wouldn't begrudge him a single penny he made from this book. I was very saddened when I heard he died a while back. RIP Noel.

As always, when dealing with books on legendary people like Hendrix, you're better off with something written by someone who was actually *there*. And Noel Redding certainly was there.Certainly one of the best books I've read on Hendrix.

This book focuses on what happened inside the Experience, musically and financially in a way that a non-member of the group could not know. Noel is at times obsessed with past injustices, but to not present it all in this manner would make it seem like "whining". There is good advice to musicians, even today, of things to be careful of: drugs, contracts, agents, etc. I bought this at the same time as Mitch Mitchell's book. Mitch's book had better pictures, and certainly gave a glimpse of the time with Jimi after Noel left, but I liked this one just as well. I wish Noel the best, and now I'm going to order a CD or two, and hope he sees some royalty from that!!!