Jimi Hendrix
Civic Center
St. Paul, Minnesota
May 3, 1970

Quality: C

aud.1stgen>cd-r>EAC>WAV>Trader'sLittleHelper>FLAC

Intro
Fire
Room Full Of Mirrors
Lover Man
Hear My Train
Ezy Rider
Machine Gun
Freedom
Foxy Lady
Red House
Star Spangled Banner
Purple Haze
Voodoo Child (Slight Return)

Notre: JM was nice nough to share this recording he found with me and others....From Chris Dixon's site:

May 3, 2010 marks 40 years since Jimi's 'Cry of Love' tour visited the St. Paul (Minnesota) Civic Center. The tape is of low-fi yet listenable quality. There is distortion of varying degrees and some cyclical tape phasing throughout, as well as a number of cuts and dropouts. The vocal and guitar are quite clear, the drums less so and the low end, i.e. kick drum and bass, suffer the most (can be made a bit better with eq). Jimi seems to be having trouble with his guitar rig at a number of points.

Tape opens with crowd cheering and Jimi saying "Does everybody feel all right?" in his best Wolfman Jack voice! There's some pounding noises and Jimi introduces Mitch as "...hammering away...". Is it possible Mitch had to drive nails into the stage to keep the bass drum from sliding *himself*!? Band opens with 'Fire' and we may be hearing Billy throwing in some vocals on the chorus.

'Roomful' gets a few extra bars of soloing before the vocals enter. Didn't often put such a new song so early in the set.

Jimi intros 'Lover Man' as "Look Out Baby I Must Be Splitting 'Cause Here Comes Your Lover Man"!

Tape quality seems to improve a bit as we get into 'Hear My Train' though, as always, the quieter stuff is better on marginal recordings. Jimi starts the main solo in the high registers with a piercing yet fairly clean tone. At about 4:10 he does a very cool hammered-on climb to the very top of the neck, followed shortly after by a section of whammy-bent sustained notes and trills (a bit like Machine Gun). At 6:15 he even throws in a little pickup switch manipulation reminiscent of the studio VC(SR). At 7:00 he pulls back to some clean, bluesy playing w/wah leading back to the last verse. Tags "...be a magic boy" with "anything to wake you up, baby...". As he builds it up to the last chorus the guitar seems much quieter and cleaner than he usually uses, possibly gear trouble, but he manages to kick it into the final solo, keeping it brief and ending on a rather sudden E chord at 10:00.

'Ezy Rider' features some nice feedback overtone tails to the climbing chords at the end!

'Machine Gun' dedicated this time to "...soldiers in Milwaukee, Chicago, Philly (there's a new one!) and oh yes Viet Nam and Cambodia" but appends it with "...so many wars, but this is dedicated to people fighting wars within themselves". Jimi has been quoted as considering himself one of those at times. The still turbulent days of protest against the escalation of the Nam war would result in the Kent State murders less than 24 hours later. Jimi starts with the guitar quite trebly, amid a rush of recognition from the audience. Main solo takes off about 3:20 and around 4:00 we hear some apparent manipulation of the UniVibe speed pedal. At 5:15 he mixes in some longer sustained feedback notes with the faster soloing, but at 6:00 it becomes an uncontrolled squeal, with Jimi dropping out for about 30 seconds to return with some more muted wah playing. Lays back on the guitar a bit and adds an unusual 'talking rap' using some of the familiar MG lyrics plus some ad libs. At 8:30 he doubles the main bass riff then does a brief section of the 'wobbly' whammy bar notes before a brief blast of feedback ends it at 10:00.

the tape cuts to the first verse of 'Freedom' and a brief gap follows shortly after. The solo features another hammered-on climbing riff at 2:30. Jimi uses the wah the bridge this time, but sadly the tape suddenly cuts to the last chord of the song. Ah well....

Jimi plays the 'Spanish Castle Magic' opening riff briefly but, unless a song is missing from the tape, does 'Foxy Lady' instead (SCM was absent the previous night as well). Some more guitar (and tape) trouble evident during 'Foxy'.

'Red House' makes its second tour appearance. On a close listen, sure sounds like he's using the Gibson Flying V here, with its midrangey 'nasal' sound. This would be his custom-ordered V that he has for the rest of the '70 shows, a lefty model (a novelty for Jimi!) with nonstandard inlays on the fingerboard, a split diamond pattern as seen on Gibson's Trini Lopez hollowbody guitar model (it's now in the Hard Rock Cafe). There are pics of Jimi with a V that are said to be from the previous night in Madison (one appears, unlabelled as to venue, in the 'Concert Files' book color section). If so, he's wearing the same clothes as this night (another all nighter?) BUT the previous night's 'Red House' definitely sounds like the Strat to me (as does the whole show) so it'll have to stay in the 'mystery' file in my mind. Anyway, this rendition is paced in the classic Jimi style. The opening solo laid back but bursting at the seams with ideas, Jimi probably digging his new axe. He only does two verses of middle solo before the final vocal verse, building in intensity but staying fairly clean-toned throughout.

Jimi intros 'Star Spangled Banner' with "..stand up, 'cause we're going to play it exactly the way it is...". He repeats "..but the flag was still there..." vocally after the guitar line, maybe his only recorded vocalization on a rendition of the national anthem.

Segues to 'Purple Haze' using much the same climbing chords as Woodstock. Changes the second tag line to "Whatever it is, that pig over there put a spell on me.."! During his solo he repeats a distinct quote twice, which I believe is part of Claptons solo from Cream's 'I Feel Free'. Unusually, he skips the teeth bit at the end.

VC(SR) has a brief false start, and Jimi doesn't sing the first chorus. Fairly long solo, typically fierce. Quiets down at 4:00 for final verse, throwing in a quote from another Cream song, 'Cat's Squirrel'. Final lines have him going back and forth from pick to teeth.
The announcer talks over the inevitable encore call and says Jimi won't be back because he has a plane to catch...though the record shows that he attended a party afterward! As a postscript, the tape as originally circulated cuts at the end to about 5 minutes of a Led Zeppelin show that the taper apparently recorded over!


THE REVIEW
After his St. Paul performance, Jimi attended the after show party and headed to New York City to play in a benefit for Timothy Leary at the Village Gate. He left behind a pretty good impression on the only known St. Paul concert reviewer. "Jimi Hendrix sheds excess showiness, puts focus on guitar" reads the headline of a local review in the St. Paul Dispatch the next day, written by Marshall Fine, identified in a tagline after the piece as "a student in journalism at the University of Minneapolis."

"It's as if lead guitarists have fallen out of vogue," Fine wrote. "Suddenly everyone is into horns; it's as if the days of the guitar solo are numbered. Jimi Hendrix, sans horns, brought all the focus back to the guitar Sunday night during his concert at the St. Paul Auditorium.

"Hendrix was leaner and meaner than when he played here in November 1968 (at the Minneapolis Auditorium). The most notable improvement is the cut away of excess flash that used to be a standard in his act. More appreciable now is Hendrix's amazing talent that has been lurking beneath the garish showiness since he made his American debut at the Monterey Pop Festival of 1967.

"Hendrix started off Sunday with a fast, light version of "Let Me Stand Next To Your Fire," one of the songs from his first album. His short solo showed right away that he is calmer, cleaner and more imaginative than he was over a year ago. There was fluidity in his guitar work that he's never shown before. All Hendrix's concentration was on his playing and very little of his effort was devoted to the backbends and gymnastics that were once his trademarks.

"He also showed a foxy sexuality in his singing and in his little introductions to each song. His movements were as graceful and as lustful as his playing. He displayed a controlled abandon in the faster numbers which come closer to rhythm and blues than anything else.

"He's currently being backed by Mitch Mitchell, his drummer from the original Jimi Hendrix Experience, and by bassist Billy Cox, who was with him in a short lived group called A Band of Gypsies. Both were competent and provided a good back ground but the show belonged to Hendrix.

"Preceding Hendrix were two groups, Savage Grace and Oz. Savage Grace had an excellent pianist and good vocal arrangements. Their sound was solid but they had little showmanship and ended up being fairly boring. Oz, on the other hand, started slowly, then picked up speed with two or three country rock numbers which also featured some nice harmonies. They were good enough to make the audience want more, but [the] group quit while they were ahead."