Music Babble

but for me, Jimi's sloppiness was part of his appeal. Clean guitarists like Eddie Van Halen bore me to tears- Jimi's exploratory, "embrace your mistakes" approach took him to far more interesting places IMO. So yes, both the playing and the sound on "Woodstock" is absolutely on the rough side but that's what I want from both Jimi and live albums in general and the creativity of the soloing more than makes up for it.

You're probably right that Jimi was "exhausted" given his time slot but he was also trippin balls- he famously dosed his headband with liquid acid, which seeped into his forehead while he played. The show even starts with an audience member yelling "Jimi, are you high?" and he of course answers in the affirmative. Not that this necessarily results in a good performance but I think it at least partly explains the creativity of his soloing (and hey, Carlos was also trippin during Santana's performance and thought his guitar turned into a giant snake but still managed to play an amazing set so probably some killer acid circulating- not sure if it was the infamous "brown" stuff though).