Johnny Winter Interview 1986

Steve Paul, who was my manager, had a club called Steve Paul's
The Scene, which was the happening rock club in New York in 1968.
All the nice-looking groupies were there, and the musicians were
there because the chicks were there, so it worked out all right
for everybody concerned. There were a lot of real interesting jams
there, though how good they were would depend on what state of
inebriation the musicians were in. Now, of course, as soon as I'd
heard Jimi's first record I was in love with his band, so it was
a natural thing for me to want to play with him; and he was real
interested in slide, and so he seemed to enjoy playing with me. He
never really made much of an effort to learn slide, though. As good
as he was, I'm sure he could've done it. I think he had time booked
at the Record Plant every damn night, and he'd get different people
different nights: when the Scene would close down they'd go over to
the Record Plant and put down jams. Then he'd listen to them the next
day, when he'd be straighter, and hopefully get ideas from them. There
weren't that many real tunes during the jams we had, but
there was one Guitar Slim song called "The Things I Used To Do"
where I played slide and Jimi played and sang. As far as I can
remember,that was the only actual song we did. The rest of that
crap, that Jim Morrison stuff, isn't really me: I never even met
Jim Morrison. We did a lot of jamming at the Hit Factory, stuff
that's on tape, but as I remember there wasn't anything that
could've been called a song. By the time we met we both had our
styles, but you can always learn something from anybody, and I'm
sure that there are little things in my playing that I don't even
think about anymore that are Jimi. But a lot of those things would
be because we listened to the same people coming up, so we really
learned from a lot of the same guys, like Howlin' Wolf and Muddy
Waters. Jimi was really familiar with the blues; he could play
good straight blues, and he knew all those guys. That's what he was,
really: a great electric blues player. He just stretched it out.
He had more chords, he didn't stick to just a three-chord thing, But
his playing was all blues. He had so much feeling, and he
expanded it with the electronics, some people want to call them
gimmicks, but they're hard to work with. I get all goofed up
when I start using that stuff, but Jimi would hook up
all these different things together and know how to work them.
It was really amazing what he could do with them: it was like
playing a whole other instrument. It was blues, but it was Jimi.
It was like 21 st century music. He took ideas from everywhere,
but it all came out Jimi Hendrix. There'll never be anybody who
could do what he did any better. You asked what he was like as
a person. Well, the main thing he was involved with were music
and balling chicks, and he really didn't talk much to anybody
about politics or growing up or whatever. He'd be friendly but
kind of distant, not the kind of guy you'd pull out your problems
to. When you're that big, you just can't let yourself open to
everybody. It's one reason he liked Billy Cox, because Billy
really knew him, knew what he was like before it all happened
to him. See, once you've made it, everybody feels like they
know you, and it can be very lonely. Jimi didn't have anybody
who was just looking out after Jimi; that was one of the main
problems. Everybody wanted something. It's too bad that Jimi
wasn't looking out for Jimi either. If only he'd had somebody
to say,"Hey man, put yourself in the hospital for a while, get
away from the dope, think about what you want to do"; it would
have made a lot of difference. But in those days drugs were
thought of as something good, and Jimi was thought of as the
king of that whole thing: Jimi and Janis were the king and queen
of the drug culture. They almost had to die, because you can't
have a culture based on drugs. Toward the end every time I'd see
him he'd look more and more depressed. It almost had to end the
way it did.