Jimi Hendrix: South Saturn Delta (1997)
Most fans and industry insiders rejoiced when Jimi Hendrix's heirs finally regained control of his estate in the 1990s, but some of the resulting compilations -- much like the validity of said "family" -- turned out rather sketchy and not altogether satisfying.
Case in point: 1997's South Saturn Delta, which followed the same year's attempt to assemble Jimi's intended successor to Electric Ladyland (dubbed First rays of the New Rising Sun) with a loose bag of rare or unreleased originals, demos, and alternate versions.
First the good news: orphaned children from '71's Rainbow Bridge and '72's War Heroes -- both long disowned by the Hendrix family and out of print, at the time -- were remastered here for the digital age, or, well, the beginning of it, anyway.
Regardless, both the dynamic "Look Over Yonder" and the instrumental "Midnight" unleash some of Jimi's most explosive, ahead-of-its time shredding, while the groovy, laid-back "Pali Gap" easily out-Santanas Santana.
Now for the bad news: these numbers account for most of this collection's highlights, except for another devastating heavy blues in "Here He Comes (Lover Man)" and rare Experience B-side, "The Stars that Play with Laughing Sam's Dice," once found solely on the U.K.-only Smash Hits ('68) and Loose Ends ('74) comps.
But no one -- at least not me -- needed yet another alternate mix or demo version of "All Along the Watchtower," "Sweet Angel" (later "Angel"), "Power of Soul," or "Message to the Universe" (a hippie-dippy trip that evolved into "Message to/of Love").
Ok, so the instrumental demo of "Little Wing" is still pretty great, but Jimi's lysergic spin on Bob Dylan's "Drifter's Escape" feels like a rough draft for a thousand aimless jams from future imitators like Black Merda, Space Farm, Electric Sun, Mahogany Rush, etc.
This, my friends, is why the Hendrix catalog can be so maddening ...
His talents were so unrivaled and unprecedented, his influence so colossal and pervasive, that we diehard fans may even want to, but ultimately can't, bring ourselves to shed our shelves of inconsistent collections like South Saturn Delta.
And don't get me started on 2010's even more chaotic and divisive Valleys of Neptune, which dragged South Saturn Delta's approach (and stupid solar system titles) to such new depths that I once joked its name was a metaphor for "scraping the bottom of the barrel."
More Jimi Hendrix: “Purple Haze,” Are You Experienced?, Axis: Bold as Love, Band of Gypsys, Electric Ladyland, The Cry of Love, Blues, First Rays of the New Rising Sun, Valleys of Neptune, Machine Gun: The Fillmore East First Show, Hollywood Bowl, August 18, 1967.
