No. 255 – Voodoo Chile (Slight Return)

Performer: Jimi Hendrix

Songwriter: Jimi Hendrix

Original Release: Electric Ladyland

Year: 1968

Definitive Version: Live at Berkeley, 2003, although the one from Woodstock really is the best. That version, of course, includes Stepping Stone, so it’s really a medley. However, when you consider that it also kicked off what I said once was the best 25 minutes in recorded rock history, that can’t be ignored entirely.

I had such a great time visiting Jin in Los Angeles in 1996 that Debbie and I decided to go back the next year. Debbie preferred the northern half of the state, but when she realized that we could combine an L.A. visit with San Diego, where her aunt Wilma lived, that made it a done deal.

In keeping with our usual pattern of taking longer vacations in the fall, we scheduled our trip for mid-October. This is important to note, because it fell during the World Series. In 1997, I had jumped totally on the Cleveland Indians bandwagon.

First, my beloved Reds stunk, so what was the fun in following them? Second, I didn’t grow up hating the Indians, so after moving back to Ohio in 1994, it was easy to begin rooting for them, too. Third, the Indians somehow had taken out the hated Skankees in the ALDS, of course, on a dramatic home run by Sandy Alomar off the now-retiring Cyborg. How you could not root for that?

Then came the ALCS. For my money, the 1997 ALCS between the Indians and the Baltimore Orioles was one of the best playoff series of the 1990s, behind only the 1991 World Series and arguably the 1999 NLCS. Every game was a nail-biter with all sorts of crazy twists and turns. (When was the last time YOU saw a playoff game won on a steal of home in extra innings?)

So I was invested fully in the Indians when we went to California, but I wouldn’t be able to watch any games due to social graces and that Jin—now on her own—didn’t have a TV. I had to pick up bits and pieces where I could—a score here, a highlight there.

I was in so deep that I donned my grinning Chief Wahoo cap at The Happiest Place on Earth. There were thousands of people at Disneyland the day we went—kids eager to meet Mickey, parents cringing at the lines and prices and me … asking employees if they knew the score of the World Series game.

Actually, Disneyland was great fun. Jin had access to discounted admission, so we went. I’d never been—only to Walt Disney World in Florida and not since 1980. It was interesting to see how my two favorite attractions, the Haunted Mansion (Haunted house in Disneyland) and Pirates of the Caribbean, differed from the rides in Florida. They differed a lot.

I liked how the Haunted House was a New Orleans style manor instead of a brick turret mansion. But I really loved the differences with Pirates of the Caribbean, before the influx of Captain Jack Sparrow years later.

The big one was how at the start of the ride, you float past a restaurant as you head into the tunnel that takes you down to the ride itself. The setting is a Louisiana bayou, complete with fireflies and chirping crickets. Just before you get to the tunnel, you pass a tumble-down shack, where an unseen swampman sits in his rocking chair with a dog next to him. That you can hear but not see the guy on the porch makes it just creepy enough to get you ready for the “Dead Men Tell No Tales” portion of the Pirates ride. I dug it.

Aside from Disneyland, the 1997 trip was the one where I discovered the spaghetti carbonara at Caffe Luna, but a discovery of another kind took place when we went to Santa Monica. When we arrived, we learned that we would be serenaded by what appeared to be The Beach Boys, circa 1960. The trio looked to be high-school kids decked out in white pants and red-stripe shirts.

As we rode the ferris wheel on the pier, they started to play but not the surf music of earlier. Instead they started with a Hendrix medley that took me by surprise. The first song was Third Stone From the Sun, which, of course, is surf music on acid, followed by, I think, The Wind Cries Mary.

That was cool enough, but after that they ripped into Voodoo Chile (Slight Return), which is anything but surf music, and they burned up the pier. I was beside myself on the ferris wheel. Who are these guys? These guys are fantastic!

By the time we got off the ferris wheel, they were back to playing their usual set of surf tunes, which were good but nothing like the Hendrix medley. I went over to their merch table, looking for a CD that might have any Hendrix on it, which, of course, there wasn’t, because the rights would’ve been astronomical. I at least got the name of the band. It was The Killers.

Just kidding. Actually, I never caught the name of the band, but I still can’t get over how amazing they were. They were way more amazing than the World Series, which ended dismally for anyone on the Tribe bandwagon.