Coupla thoughts: Thought "In My Life" might be John's greatest song for a while.
Meanwhile, back to London in 1966, one of my top 10 favorite Jimi tunes, "Third Stone from the Sun".
With apologies for the forced ads in the link, it's the only way I could find the tune (thanks to heavy copyright restrictions, I assume)
https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1j0un
Now, it's been said Jimi was a great sci-fi fan and the lyrics reflect it:
Starfleet to scoutship, please give your position, Over.
I'm in orbit around the third planet from the star called
the sun. Over.
You mean its the earth? Over.
Positive. It is known to have some form of intelligent
species. Over.
I think we should take a look.
Strange beautiful grass of green,
With your majestic silver seas
Your mysterious mountains I wish to see closer
May I land my kinky machine
Strange beautiful grass of green,
With your majestic silver seas
Your mysterious mountains I wish to see closer
May I land my kinky machine
Although your world wonders me,
With your majestic and superior cackling hen
Your people I do not understand,
So to you I shall put an end
And you'll
Never hear
Surf music again
Secret
Oh, secret
Oh
Shhhh...
Maybe he'd just read Vonnegut's story about the alien:
"A flying saucer creature named Zog arrived on Earth to explain how wars could be prevented and how cancer could be cured. He brought the information from Margo, a planet where the natives conversed by means of farts and tap dancing. Zog landed at night in Connecticut. He had no sooner touched down than he saw a house on fire. He rushed into the house, farting and tap dancing, warning the people about the terrible danger they were in. The head of the house brained Zog with a golfclub."
― Kurt Vonnegut,
Breakfast of Champions
The cackling hen may have been inspired by the giant chickens who overran the village in Wells's "The Food of the Gods", a masterpiece in its own right.
Or it may have been a reference to Bill Cosby's "Chicken Heart (That Ate New York City)" routine from
Wonderfulness (released in May '66).
Maybe it's no coincidence Cosby lifted the music for "Purple Haze" for the title track of
Hooray For The Salvation Army Band.
However, the dirtiest little secret regarding "Third Stone.." is not so much the obvious plagiarism of the title from the
Twilight Zone episode
"3rd From the Sun":
It's the hitherto undisclosed fact that Jimi came up with the music while watching TV with the sound off and the radio (or the stereo) on, a popular pastime in the early hash-smoking days.)
Somebody switched to an oldies station just as they were cuing up "A Summer Place"
Inspired, Jimi picked up a spare guitar (he always had one layin' around) and proceeded to rip up the violin parts.
I know this is a true story because he came to me once in a vision I had while tripping and told it to me.
"Yes". It changed everything. Along with The Yardbirds aka Roger the Engineer, both released in mid '66 just in time for Hendrix to arrive in London in September, and get inoculated.