#ramatam

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."

Black Merda: Black Merda (1970)

Black Merda’s self-titled debut from 1970 is what happens when a group of Detroit-based R&B musicians discover Jimi Hendrix and reinvent themselves as psychedelic rock ‘n’ soul explorers.

Can you dig it?

Guitarist Anthony Hawkins, bassist V.C. Veasey, and drummer Tyrone Hite began playing together in school before paying their dues as both session and backing musicians (usually billing themselves as The Impacts) for Motor City contractors like Fortune Records and Golden World Studios.

By the late ‘60s, they’d backed major names like Jackie Wilson, Joe Tex, The Chi-Lites, and even cracked the Motown assembly line behind The Temptations, The Spinners, and hard funk pioneer Edwin Starr, who dubbed them The Soul Agents and made them his permanent support unit. (*)

But the trio had also fallen under the spell of cutting-edge British rock groups like Cream and The Who, plus transatlantic superstar, Hendrix, whose Are You Experienced? LP inspired them to cut one of the first known covers of “Foxey Lady,” still as The Soul Agents.

With the addition of Anthony’s younger sibling Charles on second guitar, they officially became a self-contained rock band, flirting with the name Murder Incorporated, then Black Murder, and finally settling on Black Merda, because they felt it represented the African American slang and enunciation.

Little did they know that “merda” is the Portuguese word for “shit,” but that’s beside the point: Black Merda’s revolution would not be televised in far-flung locales like Portugal, Brazil and, uuuuh, Mozambique, though the group was signed to Chess Records by label scion Marshall Chess himself. (**)

This album soon followed, but, band members weren’t pleased with Chess’ lackluster production, complaining that it failed to capture Black Merda’s fuzz-laden fusion of acid rock, soul and blues with the proper intensity.

I can tell you that, outside of dynamic opening cut “Prophet,” there’s no evidence here of Jimi’s hard rock energy, let alone his superhuman shredding, and yet if every song had been this strong, Black Merda might have had a fighting chance.

Instead, subsequent Hendrix dilutions like “Good Luck” and “That’s the Way it Goes” are ever-blurrier, frustratingly mellow carbon copies, and along with instrumental guitar showcases like the breezy “Windsong” and the interminable “Over and Over” (which takes al of five minutes to go absolutely nowhere), they possess none of the master’s emotional power, nor his six-string fireworks.

Luckily, small victories like “Ashamed,” “Think of Me,”  the folksy “Think of Me,” and especially “Cynthy-Ruth” finally deliver on the enticing promise of a rock ‘n’ soul hybrid, but the album’s tepid sonics totally fail political statements like “Reality,” “I Don’t Want to Die,” and “Set Me Free” -- each of them way too stoned to join the march. 

So, not to abuse that Portuguese coincidence, but it didn’t take long for the shit to hit the fan: Black Merda’s debut sold poorly, Chess’ promotional team got cold feet, Hite split (replaced by one Bob Crowder), and 1972’s funkier Long Burn the Fire (credited simply to Mer-Da), was dead on arrival.

The inevitable break-up followed and the musicians retreated into session work and utter obscurity, until a new millennium rediscovery (yes, another one) encouraged them to reunite minus Hite, who passed in 2004, and take Black Merda back out on the road and into the studio to record ‘09’s Force of Nature.

* A few sources suggest that Hawkins, Veasy, and Hite play on such seminal Starr singles as “Twenty-Five Miles” and the stone-cold classic “War,” but others say that’s not so -- anyone know for sure?

** Around this time, they also backed psychedelic soul eccentric Fugi (a.k.a. Ellington Jordan) on his Mary, Don't Take Me on No Bad Trip LP for Chess.