Album Review: 05 Experiencing The Best Of Jimi Hendrix

Album Review: 05

Experiencing The Best of Jimi Hendrix

This review was originally posted on rateyourmusic. It was one of the reviews I was assigned in the "Go Review That Album" game on their community forums. This version of the review has had some editing and corrections.

Jimi Hendrix Experience Hendrix: The Best of Jimi Hendrix

1997 MCA Records MCAD-11671

****

"I'm not the only soul who's accused of hit and run
Tire tracks all across your back
I can see you had your fun
But darlin' can't you see my signals turn from green to red
And with you I can see a traffic jam straight up ahead"

This is almost the ultimate Jimi Hendrix greatest hits collection. But why is it called Experience Hendrix when it doesn't even have Are You Experienced? on it? Oh well I guess you can't have everything you want. The tunes that are included on this album are most of the rest of Jimi's greatest hits. Some of the intros and outros of a few of the songs, seem like they are missing something. I'm not sure but I think they weren't quite sure where to begin or end a song from an original segue from one song into the next.

I remember when I was a kid, I had gotten bored of some of the Hendrix songs because I heard them so often on my local "classic" rock radio station. * Back in the days when they called it "Album Oriented Rock" or just plain "rock" just before stations started using the "Classic" rock label. In fact, I used to get annoyed whenever I would hear Hendrix's recording of The Star Spangled Banner from Woodstock. I used to think it was horrible because he was being "creative" with the national anthem. Well when I got older, I started to appreciate creativity by putting your own spin on a standard. Even if Hendrix was stoned while he was playing it, you have to admit that he was a talented guitarist.

I feel that the first part of the album is practically super hit after super hit, then somewhere after Foxy Lady the pace slows down slightly then picks up some and then of course it ends with the show stopping (or rather morning starting) The Star Spangled Banner, maybe because some of those songs I had barely heard, before I had gotten this disc.

* I have a whole lot of songs and artists that I have heard so often I am tired of them. It doesn’t necessarily mean I hate the artists I am just tired of them or their “anthem” songs/hits. Some of the artists on my list are Led Zeppelin (especially Stairway To Heaven), The Doors, Bruce Springsteen, The Rolling Stones, James Taylor and probably a few other artists.

Misheard Lyrics: Bangles Walk Like An Egyptian

We have all done it, mankind has done it since he started putting vocals to music. I am talking the musical version of "the telephone game". You know where something is said but you hear something completely different and believe what you heard is the right line. A mishearing or misinterpretation of a phrase or song lyrics is called a Mondegreen. There are at least two websites devoted to this sort of thing as it applies to song lyrics: Am I Right? and KissThisGuy Can you believe all the people who used to think (and some still do) that Jimi Hendrix sang the line "Excuse me while I kiss this guy"?

One of the songs that it took me a while to get the right words for was Elton John's "Bennie & The Jets". NO I didn't think that "electric boots" were "electric boobs" like so many did. I was too young to know what a mohair suit was but understood that line.  For me it was the line "Oh Bennie she's really keen" at first I couldn't figure out the "really keen" part and thought it was "Oh Bennie she's a rent-a-Queen" or "Bennie she's a real queen.". Which is a little closer. Oh maybe I should be a writer for "Don't Forget The Lyrics!"

Now as for the song I intended this thread to be about. For as long as the song has been around there were some lyrics that I never quite heard correctly. Even seeing the real lyrics and trying to listen for them it is hard for me to hear the real lyrics. The song I am talking about as recorded by The Bangles from their Album Different Light is Walk Like An Egyptian.

The Bangles: Different Light copyright The Bangles and Columbia Records.

To start things off the opening line:
I used to think the second line was "They do the SAME dance don't you know"

The real line is:
"All the old paintings on the tombs,
They do the sand dance don't you know"

Screen capture from official "Walk Like an Egyptian" video.

Here is the more difficult verse/lines:
Most of the line was unintelligible to me something like "slight bit a street and your back, shift then you call a cop (also sounds like call a cock), Let the Sargent know (oh whey oh), they strike a pose on a Cadillac".

Now the real verse is:
"Slide your feet up the street bend your back,
Shift your arm then you pull it back,
Life is hard you know (oh whey oh),
So strike a pose on a Cadillac.

If you want to find all the cops,
They're hanging out in the donut shop."

Screen capture from official "Walk Like an Egyptian" video.

OK so excuse me NO I will not kiss this guy, I don't play for that side of the field.
Now my favorite misheard song lyrics- "Don't hold on tonight, It's bound to take your life, There's a bathroom on the right."