The Jimi Hendrix Experience: Winterland

What is your preferred version of the 1968 Winterland concerts I fancy revisiting it this weekend but can't decide which version to listen to ?

 

Just get the box set and play that.
The Douglas version was my introduction to Winterland which has some good highlights

 

I have all releases including grey market and Douglas versions that is my dilemma

 

It depends on what are your requirements?

Good sound?
The entire shows?
The highlights?

For convenience I usually play the box set, yes it is flawed but has best sound and most comprehensive official Winterland recordings available. Why they didn't just put out the complete shows I'll never know.

 

I've read it was because of technical issues with some tracks.

 

was it the technical issues that caused the edited down of key songs ??

 

The box set. It isn't perfect, but it is the best option.

 

I don't mean to sound crass, bragging or in any way obnoxious by saying this, but having been there, none of the recordings do all that much for me. They're like the shadow of a giant mountain. The actual experience cannot be duplicated for me. If a good soundboard recording with video were available though, I might think differently, but even that is a big "maybe".

All that said, I'm glad the recordings were made.

 

Amps going out; multiple times per day.
Wish Mesa could have powered the shows!

 

The raw tapes play great in the car in that all the road noise sort of goes with sound of the recordings.
As for the amps going out and recording flaws, that too sort of goes with the car trip, I find it interesting how the band on stage deal with these problems. I have always found Jimi's noodlings between tunes up's, fastening.

 

For years I played the hell out of "The Jimi Hendrix Concerts" (6 Winterland tracks) and "Live At Winterland" and I loved and still love Alan Douglas's production with the reverb - it really sounds like The Experience filling a big hall with gigantic sound. I enjoyed making cassettes and CDs combining those two albums plus the "Winterland +3" tracks (and the "Spanish Castle Magic" from Univibes' "Calling Long distance"!).
Then I played and played the raw bootleg tapes, warts and all and loved them just as much.
So by the time the box set came out (faaar too late ) it didn't have the same impact. Still, it's great to plunge in now and again but I don't do so very often, tending to forget that it's there on the shelf. The one CD version which came out at the same time as the box set is very good and I tend to forget about that also.

 

boxset

 

I remember when I bought the LP; I was 12 years old, and was blown away when I opened it up and it was clear vinyl!
Still has my favorite version of "Hey Joe".

 

Are the tracks on Winterland Concerts different performances to the Live At Winterland, maybe its time to combine them into a great 2 cd set ? (I have actually choosen to listen to 3 Nights At Winterland, I can't get over the edits in the EH Boxset, such a shame that could have been killer )

 

Which one ?

 

newest one

 

I'm not a fan of the box set. Too much redundant material. A best of mix from the box is my go-to option.

 

A breakdown of the Winteland recordings is here (take a deep breath!):
live

 

The vinyl box set.

However, before that my "go to" were DATs taken from low gen cassettes.

 

The box set, despite some annoying edits. And the interview at the end of disc four could have been replaced with another versions of Spanish Castle Magic and Like a Rolling Stone.

 

Yes, we didn't need the interview in the box. In fact that "Bonus" Disc 4 is dumb. They should have put the band's superb opening of the three-night residency ("Are You Experienced"/"Voodoo Child (Slight Return)"/"Red House") on Disc 1 fer crissakes instead of starting off with the second set of the night.

 

It was certainly weirdly sequenced. I understand that not everything that was recorded was releasable, but i still think it would have been better to keep the shows sequence as close as possible to the original setlist, even if there were couple of Foxy Lady's or Hey Joe's missing. Robert Fripp did that kind of thing with King Crimson's The Great Deceiver box set, and it worked fine.

 

I resequenced the songs in their proper order on iTunes, granted there are omissions, but at least the songs that were released are now in their historically accurate sequencing.

 

I am trying to do that (and match the sound to the Douglas versions) but I need the vinyl single version of Purple Haze, does anyone know if its on a previous release ?

 

I wonder if EH will release the set again in its complete form and in the right sequence ??