Lemmy Kilmister once picked his favourite Jimi Hendrix song
For a man who could boil water with a look, Lemmy was never too leather-clad to reveal his soft centre. Thus, it is no surprise that the notion of Jimi Hendrix in the troublesome pastures of spurned love is one that has an allure for Lemmy. This is particularly prominent given the Motörhead frontman’s connection with the guitar God on a personal level.
As it happens, for a brief time in 1967, Lemmy was a roadie with the psychedelic Seattle musician. “I was sleeping on Neville Chester’s floor — he was sharing a flat with Noel Redding,” Lemmy told Rolling Stone, adding: “So whenever they needed an extra pair of hands I was right there. I didn’t get the job for any talent or anything.” Naturally, this experience had a profound impact on the future rocker.
One of the perks of the job was seeing the masterful Hendrix at work: “But I did see Jimi play a lot. Twice a night for about three months. I’d seen him play backstage too. He had this old Epiphone guitar — it was a 12-string, strung as a six-string — and he used to stand up on a chair backstage and play it. Why he stood up on the chair, I don’t know.”
As Lemmy said when reflecting on the greatest acts of the period, “[The Beatles] would come on stage and you were just awestruck. They had that presence, which is very rare. Hendrix had it, Ozzy Osbourne has it to an extent. You’ve either got it or you haven’t.” Lemmy had it too and he learnt plenty of tricks from his former boss.
Beyond the notion of presence, one element that stuck with him was to put a bit of soul into your rocking. One song, in particular, proved illuminating for Lemmy on this front. When he was listing his favourite songs, the one Hendrix pick that made the list was ‘Love or Confusion’.
The song sees Hendrix question whether he’s finally found the sort of love that will allow him to pop his feet up and bask in it, or if it’s just another false imposter promising deceit and pain. After all, Hendrix was a sensitive and shy soul, and the wild ways of the rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle were not all that fitting for him as hangers-on flirted with him for reasons beyond the norm.
This made ‘Love or Confusion’ one of the most direct in his back catalogue. Hendrix might’ve twisted the blues beyond recognition, but it always formed the lifeblood before the flourishes entered the mix. As John Frusciante said about the star: “His life, and his lifestyle, and the women in his life, affected his music more so than other musicians did because that’s how free his playing sounds,” he once explained. “When you hear Jimi Hendrix play, it’s a pure expression of him as a person.”
Adding: “You see him on stage and there’s absolutely no separation between him and his guitar—they’re completely one because he’s just putting every single bit of energy, everything in his whole psyche, and every single part of his body into his guitar playing,” he said. With ‘Love or Confusion’ that is particularly apparent and it certainly caught the ear of Lemmy.
