Stone Free Abrupt Fade

[cta]

Now I have tons of Hendrix stuff...all the albums on Reprise, including the horrible Midnight Lighting and Nine To The Universe.   And yes, the more recent Douglas-less MCA stuff including the boxed set.   Have the 1986 Live At Monterey, 1982 released "Concerts" - which should be put back in print - 1987's Rykodisk Live At Winterland and the 1970 Otis Redding/Jimi Hendrix snippet of a much rougher mix of their monterey sets.

But...is there any recordings on boot or wherever else that hasStone Free going into an interesting direction where it doesn't cut off abruptly?  Or was it made that way to represent a single after "Hey Joe" and "Purple Haze"?

Stone Free does have a rather catchy-singles feel to it compared to the more experimental and distortion drenched sound orgies of Hendrix's other 1967/1968 work so I'm thinking it's quite a possibility it was recorded for a single and nothing but for that point in time.  It sounds like it was done during the "Burning Of The Midnight" lamp sessions or same studio which were done solely for singles and AM radio at the time.  Stone Free doesn't have the clarity of the Are You Experienced? tracks and nowhere near the clarity of Axis.  You have to admit...Hendrix's early singles were geared to sound like some small group imitating Spector's echo soup cloudy sound.

Just in case, I must ask because there has to be a tape of it somewhere where it plays a longer studio version. 

I have countless live versions of it from early 1968 to almost his death where Stone Free is played for 7 minutes minimum...okay, maybe the Atlanta Festival in 1970, which I felt was a really bogged down and murky feeling show.

[cta]

sh*t.  What happened?

[endofposts]

There's a version that runs over 12 minutes long on a live album released last year on the Purple Haze label, "An Evening With The Jimi Hendrix Experience."   The reason it's so short is that it was a B-side to "Hey, Joe."  But Jimi played it live, and of course, he could drag it out when he wanted to.

[endofposts]

There is an alternate studio version, which I did not know.  It's from a boxed set released a while back.  I don't own it, but it sounds a lot different (and probably better) than the single version, from the sample on Amazon.  I don't think it's any longer, though, than the single version.  The boxed set isn't cheap, either, but maybe you can find it on P2P.