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Hello everyone, and welcome to Being Frank. We're the only way to
be is Frank. I'm your host, Frank Leblona, and I'd like to
thank you for joining us on what we like to call the Intelligent Conversation Podcast,
where no conversation is out of bounds and all points of view are welcome.
We record live to tape and I give you the dates so you have
some context. It is the twenty fifth of April twenty twenty four. When
I was a young man growing up in the late nineteen sixties and early seventies,
like most kids, I was mesmerized by the guitar wizardry of another young
man named Jimmy Hendrix. But it turns out again, also like most,
I only knew of the legend, but not the man behind it. Well,
my guest has spent thirty years of his life working to change that with
his new award winning film, Jimmy Hendrix a Documentary. It's a detailed look
behind the scenes from the people who knew him best and what made the music
and the man immortal being Frank welcomes it's producer, writer, director of mister
David Kramer. David, thank you so much for taking some time to join
us. Thank you, David. I guess let's start from the beginning.
What drew you to the project in the first place? Why Jimmy Hendrix.
You could pick a lot of people to do a documentary on why Jimmy Hendrix.
Well, first and foremost was the music. I loved the music and
that's what initially drew me to him. And then the whole thing about it
was freedom. Hendrix was all about freedom, and that's probably what got him
into trouble. He was a free spirit, nonconformist. As he sings in
If six was nine Wave on Missed the businessman. You can't dress like me
and stone free. You know, he says, they talk about me like
a dog, talk about the clothes I wear, but they don't realize they're
the ones who's square baby. So so talking to you from the beginning,
in a sense, the music right away flicked with something inside it. Yeah.
I just loved the freedom of it. And you know, the way
he dressed and the way he looked and The one thing I really, I
really thought was cool was he had all these beautiful white girlfriends, which I
thought was really cool because it was in the it was during the civil rights
movement at the peak, and it was pretty controversial. So I know he
pissed some people off, like specifically Jed Cahoover to have all these white girlfriends
interesting, and uh, I wanted to be like that, So I wanted
to have beautiful black girlfriends interesting. So you know what it was. It
was a big statement. You know, he made a big statement. Well,
you know, it's a question I had further down, but let's go
to it now because it makes sense. My favorite word segue. It's a
good segue. What did you find out that surprised you within the documentary while
while making it? And as I said in my intro, there was the
public image of the man, which we kind of know. But what what
else did you find out about Jimmy Hendrix the man that might have been a
surprise to you and might be a surprise to others, especially considering his public
PERSONA found out a lot of things. Uh, you know, there was
a lot of controversy, a lot of you know, the FBI files,
they had on him and his management stealing all his money, him getting kidnapped.
A lot of bad things happened to him that most people don't really know
about. So that was How did that affect him as a person? It
had to as a young man. I mean, he was in his twenties.
We forget that he passed away as a very young man. So this
was happening at a time when most people are just kind of making up their
minds, you know, maybe fresh out of school. I know I was,
And he's been hitting with all these major things. How did it affect
him as a man and as an artist? Can you put a finger on
that? Oh? He was very frustrated with it. You know. The
management wanted him to stick with the Jimmy Hens experience, the three piece power
trio, and he wanted to grow and expand and try different things, and
the management wanted him to keep doing what he was doing, and he didn't
want to do that anymore. That was one of the big frustrations because as
an artist, you want to grow and try new things. You don't want
to be stuck doing the same thing your whole career. So that was one
of his biggest frustrations. Tell us a little bit more about Jimmy the Man
again. We know the flamboyant style of playing, etc. But one of
the things, and I did, I saw your clip at the Nayak Film
Festival where he won, by the way, the award for the Best Documentary
and this year's International Film Festival, congratulations. And I did see it,
and I did enjoy it very much. But one of the things that kind
of struck me, at least from the hour clip that I saw, was
despite his very flamboyant public persona, he was kind of almost a quiet person
almost. I don't know if shy as the right word, but personally it
didn't necessarily match, as you said, the flamboyant close, the flamboyant playing,
the lighting, the guitar on fire, et cetera. It was almost,
is it safe to say, it was kind of like an alter ego
from what he really was. And you're the man you interviewed his family and
friends, et cetera. What did you find out about that? Yeah,
he was, he was very shy. He was with drawn, and then
probably goes back to his childhood because his father was really strict, his mother
wasn't around, and he was afraid to say too much because he'd get hit
by his father. His father was pretty abusive. So it started as a
very young child that he was very withdrawn and quiet and shy. And he
carried on into his adult life and everybody said he was very shy and quiet.
He wasn't good in crowds. He was good one on one with people,
but in crowds he wasn't really comfortable. Well that's interesting, especially for
a man who performed in front of thousands, in some cases hundreds of thousands.
I think of Woodstock in the very famous moment, and I want to
ask you, is is that his most famous moment. We can get to
that, but I want to kind of complete the point because it was something
that really struck me. He was so outrageous, I guess as a fair
word to use as a performer. He was doing things that no one else
did. That's one of the things that made him great, not only musically
but from a performance aspect. And yet, as I said, and I
think it came out in your documentary about how inwardly shy and peaceful he was.
How I just how could was there a switch he could turn on and
off? I know? And I've interviewed other actors who really can be very
quiet and shy in their personal lives, and then you see them on the
screen, it's a whole other PERSONA. Was there a switch he could turn
on? No? People said that, you know a lot of people said
that it was like a switch. Once he got on stage, he became
a different person, became very a big extrovert on stage. And I was
comfortable up there, you know. But yeah, it was like there was
a switch that got turned down when he went on stage. It's a totally
different person then off stage. David, you spent thirty years making this project
and it is it is a project. Why did it take so long?
Oh? There was a bunch of reasons. One of the big reasons was
money. Yeah, make you a filmmaker. I could relate, yes,
you know, as I've been financing the project by myself. I don't have
any investors. I'm not rich. And if I did have investors, there'd
be deadlines, and there'd be they'd be dictating what they want and when they
want it and what should and shouldn't be put in, and I had to
do it my way. And you know, there's no deadline with me controlling
it, so I could just keep working on it until I felt it was
finished. And I was able to interview over four hundred and thirty people on
camera, the biggest names in the history of twentieth century music. So that
was, you know, money was one of the main one of the main
things. And then another reason is, you know, I don't have a
whole team of people. I'm pretty much working on it by myself. I
have my girlfriend helps a lot with with graphics and things, photo retouching.
And then I have a guy who who Elliott Elliot getzlof who's been working on
it. He's contributed a lot. He's a great detective. He's found a
lot of things and footage and photos. So it's basically just this team of
the three of us. But I've been working on it since the beginning.
They haven't been since the very beginning. I pretty much started it by myself.
At the very beginning, I used to teach at the Center for the
Media Arts in Manhattan. Used to teach computer graphics and special effects and three
D animation and all that. And there was another teacher there who's like minded,
and I asked him if he wanted to do this documentary and he said
yeah, and we started and the first I think the first interview we did
was Buzzy Linhart. Yeah, and then we did Richie Havens and then the
third interview we were going to interview War, the group War, and they
were playing at the Wetlands in Manhattan. So I loaded up my car with
all my equipment, my camera, my lights and tripods and everything. There's
a lot of stuff to carry, and if you know Wetlands, there's not
a whole lot of parking around there. So I parked a few blocks away
and then I had to lug all this equipment. And the guy that I
was working with he never showed up. I don't know what happened. He
couldn't couldn't go for some reason. I think maybe his girlfriend didn't want him
to go because there was no money in it. And anyway, once I
did this interview and I loved all the equipment and did everything by myself,
I just said to myself, I'm just gonna have to do this by myself.
I can't depend on anybody else. And he was fine with that because
he was He got married to that girl not long after this incident. Well,
to you that worked out for that worked out for him, David.
You know that that's obviously got to be frustrating. And I know I've worked
as a one man band and you called them all the cliches labors of love,
but that's what they are. But it's part of the frustration and can
be disappointments. Now, You've also had to deal with some controversy with the
film because some members of the family, As often happens with famous people,
things go into arbitration afterwards. Who has the rights to this, that and
everything. I know you've run into some situations like that as well. Can
you elaborate on that at all? Yeah? Sure, I just wanted to
say another thing about why it took so long when you when you look at
like ken Burns documentaries and you look at the credits. He's got like fifty
two hundred interns working there and he just keeps cranking these documentaries out because he's
got so many people on his team and I didn't have that, so so
you know, that was a big problem. And then after the nine to
one one attack on the World Trade Center, when the when the stock market
crashed, I lost everything, so I was broke for a couple of years,
so I couldn't do a whole lot then, you know, So there
was those different factors. Anyway, so we'll get back to the question you
just asked me about, like legal problems. You mean, yeah, there's
there are course. See, people don't realize it's not just you make a
film. There are legal issues he has you have to use a footage song,
and there has to be authorization from from his executor as all that other
stuff. It's much more complicated, I think than people realize. Yeah.
Well, when I first started the project, I contacted Jimmy's father in Seattle,
Al Hendrix, and I wrote him a letter, and then I called
him and I told him about the project and I wanted to interview him.
So he agreed to do the interview. So I flew out to Seattle and
I spent a few days with him. I interviewed him, took him out
to dinner and lunched and just hung out for a few days. And I
told him that I wanted to work with him. I said, I want
him to benefit from this. I want him to profit from it, and
I want to be like partners with him. So I have, you know,
his blessing on the whole project, and he thought it was great idea,
and I told him I want to meet with his attorney. So we
did. We met with his attorney while I was there, and everything was
great. Everybody was happy, and they didn't have the estate back at the
time. They were trying to get a lawsuit together to win the estate back
because the previous people running it was an attorney named Leo Branton and a guy
named Alan Douglas who was a record producer, and they were trying to win
the estate back. They were in the middle of this whole thing. I
never even heard of Jimmy's adopted stepsister, Janie Hendricks. Al Hendricks never even
mentioned her name, and anyway, everything was, everything seemed fine, and
I was getting ready to head back to New York. Al Hendricks gave me
a phone number in contact. He said, what this is Diane Hendricks phone
number. She was Jimmy Hendricks's first cousin. She's in New York. Why
don't you give her a call. She'll probably, you know, do an
interview. And I said, great, thank you. So I got back
to New York and I met with Diane and we became friends. And I
still never heard anything about Janey. But then during this time, Paul Allen
Bill Gates, partner from Microsoft, he wanted to build this museum in Seattle
called that he was going to name it the Jimmy Hendricks Museum, and he
lent the Hendricks family six million dollars for legal fees so they could win the
estate back. And everybody helped them. You know, my attorney helped.
He flew out there as an expert witness. Noel Redding, supplied contracts and
legal documents, everything that he saved from the sixties to help them win.
And that's when Janey appeared and she I guess she kind of spearheaded the whole
lawsuit because they were only paying Al Hendricks fifty thousand dollars a year for this
multimillion dollar estate, and he was a gardener who who didn't have a high
school diploma, and he wasn't really educated and savvy about business. He was
just happy to get the fifty thousand a year. That was a lot of
money for him. So I guess Jane started questioning that, and that's how
the whole lawsuit started. So she started telling everybody that helped the family win
the estate and we're going to take care of everybody. So everybody helped,
and then once they won the estate back, she turned the back on everybody
that helped. And I met with the attorney again, the same guy that
I met with with Al Hendricks, and I spoke to him and he told
me they fired him, and he's the one that said. His exact words
were, they turned their back on everybody that helped them. And that was
Janey behind all that. So Paul Allen, who wanted to do this Jimmy
Hendricks Museum, he ended up calling it the Experienced Music Project because Jane wouldn't
let him use the name Jimmy Hendricks after he lent six million dollars. They
wouldn't even have the estate if it wasn't for him. So there was all
this kind of greedy stuff going on. And I had different dealings with her
over the years, and I tried to work with her, but I just
realized after a couple of years it was no use because she wants everything for
herself, and she cut out all the family members and Leon Hendricks, who's
Jimmy's real brother, not a step brother. He actually grew up with Jimmy,
and she cut him out out of the will. I don't know how
that happened, because he was in the will when al was alive. But
at some point after he died he found out he was out of the will,
and he tried to do but he lost because she's got millions of dollars.
But you persist. I think that's the point ultimately want to make,
despite all the difficulties, the challenges for you alone, working alone, the
money, the family issues, and yet you continue, You persist, not
only persist today, you have persisted for thirty years. Why why yeah,
and you say no, I don't quit. Why not just say well,
I've had enough. Well after he's put in so much time and money and
and uh, he did so much great accomplishments in interviewing, Uh, over
four hundred people on camera, everybody from BB King, Buddy Guy, Bo
Diddley, Little Richard, the Isley Brothers, Steven Stills, Ginger Baker,
Jack Bruce, Timothy Leary. Uh, you know, Wavy Gravy, Eric
Burdon, who's one and on and on. There's no turning back. There's
no turning back. You can't stop. That's a great segue of all those
interviews, which one sticks out in your mind. Who's somebody that you said,
wow, that that's that's that's something you learned a lot from you felt
a lot about. Or is there one in your mind or a couple of
people in your mind that really stick out as really meaningful. Well, there's
a bunch of them. When you interview over four hundred people, there's there's
a lot of great interviews. You know, getting the family, getting you
know, Jimmy's father and brother and the people that raised him was great.
And then you know the musical icons, my my musical heroes, those were
those were great. Steven Still is one of my favorite musicians of all time.
You know, it took me like five years to get him, dealing
with his manager and once he realized it was a good project, he agreed
to do it. And uh, that was that was a great interview because
he he jammed a lot with Hendricks and they played a lot together and recorded
together, and uh, that was a thrill for me because he's one of
my favorite musicians. And then there was sly Stone, who doesn't really do
interviews, so just the fact that I got him was amazing. You know,
there's a lot of them. There's a lot of incredible interviews. You
know, Timothy Leary. I got him. He was very sick, he
had cancer, and uh, he reluctantly agreed to do it. I went
out to his to his place in the Hollywood Hills, and when I got
there, then he didn't want to go on camera. He said, can
we just do audio? And I said, well, you know, it's
a television documentary, and he was pretty reluctant. So then I said,
well, how we were outside in the Hollywood Hills, like I think Bennette
Canyon and in the backyard there, and I said to him, well,
how about we just I'll just shoot your shadow on the grass there He's sitting
in a chair. I said we could, I could shoot your shadow,
and then I guess then that's when he changed his mind and said, all
right, he'll do it. So I got him on camera, so that
was cool. Yeah. At this point I want to bring out also too,
because you mentioned Ken Burns, a famous documentary maker, and when you're
Ken Burns, just using the name opens a lot of doors. When you're
Dreamer or Frank Lebono calling it can take four or five years. I want
people to realize the persistence and the dedication that it takes to get through those
doors. We're not big name people. Hopefully this will put you in the
big name category. But I want people to really appreciate how difficult it is
and how persistent you have to be as an independent filmmaker. But I also
want to make the connection and I want your comments on it. A lot
of what you're saying seems to come right out of the Jimmy Hendricks playbook about
independence, creating your own art, your own way. Is it fair to
say that through this, Jimmy's mindset towards his own art is something that you
really connected to and continue to connect through the documentary. Is that fair?
Oh? Yeah, definitely. I'm a bit of a non conformist. I
would say, you know, I don't wear it. I don't wear a
tie. Remember It's been at least twenty thirty years since I've worn a tie.
So yeah, they can't see we're not wearing We should let people know,
David, No, we're not wearing ties. No, we're wearing I
like to tease people because there's no video. I am wearing pants, but
I'm not wearing a tie. Yeah. Yeah, I'm definitely a free spirit.
You know, I got a lot of what Hendis was about I admired,
So yeah, it's definitely part of my personality. Let's talk about some
of Jimmy's more famous moments. I mean, I think everybody certainly of our
age or of a certain age, or remember Woodstock and his seminal performance at
Woodstock. Were there any other moments that stick out in your mind which really
define Jimmy as a performer, as a and as an artist beyond the Woodstock
one? What comes to your mind? Well, when he was playing with
other bands as a side man, he was blowing people's minds because nobody ever
saw anything like that before. He's playing behind his back, in between his
legs and with his teeth, and he just really stole the show from a
lot of different bands. The early bands that he played in. I did
a segment for this documentary on each. I did five separate segments on the
five famous bands that he played in before he became famous, when he was
a sideman, Little Richard's Band, the Isley Brothers, Curtis Knight and the
Squires, Joey Dean, the Starlyres, and the King Curtis Band, And
all these segments are really interesting because just shows how he was just blowing people
away before he was even famous, just as a side man. People were
just amazed at what they saw. And when you when you see some of
these interviews of the people that witnessed it for the first time, they were
just blown away, amazed. So that was real interesting. And uh yeah,
I think Woodstock was probably the biggest, most memorable iconic performance it,
so we sent his legacy. I mean, I think when people in their
minds and their imagination, when they conjure an image of Jimmy, it's probably
that. But for obvious reasons, it was a seminal moment. Yeah.
Yeah, he played a lot of great concerts, but that one was all
filmed, and you know, it rained a lot during the three days,
but he played on the fourth day, Monday morning, which wasn't even supposed
to be It was supposed to be over by then. So the sun came
out and it was beautiful a while, and they got a great film because
the sun was shining and he looked like he was having a great time.
He was actually dancing on stage at some points, So so that was a
great That was a great performance. What would you continue, I'm sorry I
was going to say about you. You were asking me before about some of
the frustrations and the problems one of the things, and you probably I don't
know how long you spent on your documentary, not thirty years. But well
it's still going. I had. It's a long story. We we're into
the rights fees now. I want to use an Ella Fitzgerald's so I can
relate. I want to use an Ella Fitzgerald's song, so I have to
go through her state and blove so I relate. Yes, it takes a
long time. Please finish some of the frustrations you probably you know, people
probably don't even think about. Are just people's reac like so called friends that
you you know, acquaintances, the negative comments that come out sometimes, like
you know, your real friends are supportive, they ask about the project,
how's it going, You've been working on for a few years, how's it
going. I'd love to see it, can't wait till it's done, stuff
like that. But then there's these acquaintances, these so called friends that actually
get resentful and make these comments like you're still working on that thing, And
then you hear them, you know, you hear comments behind your back that
they said to other people like, yeah, he's never going to finish that.
He's been working on that forever, and all this kind of negative stuff.
And there's one guy on h I mean, there's been a bunch of
people, but one guy on Facebook really stands out in my mind where he
he came on Facebook one day and started ranting to me about, uh,
you know, when are you going to get this out? You know,
you're withholding all this stuff and the fans want to see it, and uh,
you know, you've been working on this forever. And and then you
started comparing me to Janie Hendricks and saying that I'm greedy like her, And
I said, I said greedy mostly you know, don't even don't even give
him the time of day. Let's not even go there's not even because my
next going to say, wait till you start asking for friends for a little
monetary help to get it. And then you really start hearing the comments,
well a little help you you say, I showed a trailer and oh this
is great. It made me cry. Well can you can you support it
a little bit? Well, I don't know if I do things like that
times. Have you heard that? I'm sure we can relate, Yeah,
go ahead, good stuff like that. You just you don't even expect to
hear things like that, so that was kind of shocking to me. Well,
go ahead to finish. I'm sorry. I'm just going to say.
You know, I said to the guy, I said, you want medication.
I said, I haven't made a dime off this project, and I
won't until it's finished and I get a deal. So how am I greedy?
Yeah? I don't mean. I spent more than half of you know,
my adult life, all my adult life pretty much working on this.
So I put in my time and there's no there's no reward until it's sold.
So how how can you equate that to being greedy? That's mind bowling
as an aside, and this is being frank. You will allow me to
be frank for a bit. One of the things drive me crazy when I'm
going through the TV channels and you go to the Learn channel or something and
you see things like ninety Day Fiance and cheaters and people are actually paying money
to produce that crap in plain English, where you and I are trying to
do something truthful, artistic, honest. Mine is about the Pulitzer Prize winner,
not fine, who've made a famous photo of baby Ruth at his retirement.
Yours are one of the great musical masters of all time, and try
to get a dime for that. But go to put on late night cable
and you can get Cheaters and ninety Day Fiance and Catfish, this and more
crap is being produced on my soapbox. I guess it's my show, so
I'm allowed a minute or two. But I thought, considering the context of
our conversation, it's all relative. Let's get back to make one more point
before we go to a commercial break. This has been absolutely terrific, David,
I really appreciated. What do you think what is one of the more
biggest misconceptions about Jimmy Hendrix. What do you think that people think they know
about him that may not necessarily be accurate. Is there something that comes to
your mind. Yeah, A lot of people think that he was just this
drug addict, but he wasn't. You know, everybody experimented with drugs,
especially in the sixties. Everybody was getting high back then. Some still are.
But you know, he accomplished a lot, and he was always playing
and always practicing, and that's why he was so great because he was constantly
playing, constantly practicing and jamming all the time. After a gig, after
a concert, he'd go to a club and jam till the wee hours of
the morning. It's all he'd loved to do. It was his favorite thing.
Or that and a couple other things. But yeah, that's why it
was so great because he was always practicing and always playing, and he wasn't
this strung out junkie guy that a lot of people think. And because of
the way that he died, you know, it's questionable because the autopsy doesn't
really correspond to an overdose. There wasn't enough drugs or alcohol in his system
according to the autopsy that would have killed him. So because they put it
out there that it was a drug overdose, I think it caused this stigma
towards him. And I think the next generation of kids coming up, especially
females, I think they shied away from Hendricks because of that drug stigma.
That's what it seemed like to me, because you know, the girls of
the sixties and part of the seventies that were young, they loved Hanji.
But I specifically remember, like the next generation in the late seventies and eighties,
they didn't like hen Jicks anymore, a lot of girls, and I
think it was because of this whole drug stigma scared them. Very interesting,
great point to make, and a few more to me. I we're going
to take a quick break, David. There's a few more things to talk
about his legacy. What separates this documentary from others? What do you hope
viewers will take from the film? Don't answer it yet. It's just a
little tease. We got that left to go through the first half of our
program. We'll be back with much more, but we got to take a
brief commercial break. My very special guest is the producer, writer, director
of Jimmy Hendrix, a documentary, David Kramer. This is being Frank.
I'm your host, Frank Lebono. We don't go anywhere. We got more
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with your family and friends. Have a great show for you today. Our
guest is David Kramer. He is the writer, producer, and host it
just about every I think. David Kramer of the new documentary Jimmy Hendrix's We've
talked a lot about Hendricks and what brought you here. It's time to talk
a little bit about his legacy. What would you say is the legacy of
Jimmy Hendrix? Obviously the music, the guy was unique. He was one
of a kind. Someone like him maybe comes around once every hundred years or
something. You know, nobody ever played like that. He developed a sound,
the technique, the style that was different than any other guitar player before
him. So that would be his legacy. Well, what would you say?
What would you like people to take from your film? When they say
and what's the total length? David? At this point, how many hours
do you have currently? It's about twelve to fourteen hours of various segments.
Rather than the single show, it's really a series of series. Correct,
there's all these different segments. There's the childhood segment, there's the Nashville segment.
When he got out of the the army, he went to Nashville and
formed a band there with Billy Cox, and then after that he traveled around
the Chitland circuit and hooked up with different groups like Little Richard, and he
went to New York and hooked up with the Isley Brothers and all these other
great bands. And so there's all these different segments about, you know,
covering his whole life in depth like nobody's ever done it before. The thing
about this documentary is the stories. You know, you see these, you
see other documentaries in it. It focuses on sensationalism, and he was the
wild man and all that kind of stuff, and he was doing drugs and
played at Woodstock. But there's so much more to him, and this documentary
tells these stories about all these different times in his life of what happened to
him. You know, it started out great and basically turned to crap at
the end because his manager stole all of his money and he died under mysterious
circumstances. So he was trying to get away from his manager. At the
time of his death, he was trying to get out of the contract.
And he even told an attorney that I interviewed that he said, if they
find out about this, meaning if they find out that I want to get
away from my manager, they'll kill me. And he said that to his
attorney. So there's a lot of stuff like that that people don't know what
really happened to him. And it wasn't pretty, It wasn't a but it
wasn't ending ultimately, you know, beyond the ugly ending. And it wasn't
ugly. It was a tragic ending a young man, I mean to put
in perspective, beyond the fame, the fortune, he was a young man,
Uh what else? What what? But beyond that And as you mentioned
that that's an unfortunate legacy. If you will even to use that word as
unfortunate, what would you like people to take from the film once they see
it. From the film itself and from what it says about Hendricks the man,
well, he brought he brought a lot of people together of all races,
and uh he helped to bridge the gap, uh between and black and
all the racism in this country. He helped to bring a lot of people
together, and the powers that be, Jared go Hoover's FBI didn't like that.
They opened the whole file on him and they tried to take him down,
and they probably did. I mean, they tried to tie him in
with the Black Panther Party. That's another big misconception. He wasn't involved with
the Black Panther Party at all. There was talk of him during a benefit
concert for the Black Panthers, but he never did. It just didn't happen.
But it's in his FBI file because it was the FBI that was trying
to set him up, so they had more ammunition against him. But he
wasn't overtly political from my recollection. I mean, I think he seemed to
be certainly anti war. He was involved with to a degree with the civil
rights movement, but I wouldn't have necessarily called him a political performer in a
way of let's say, maybe about Dylan or Joan Baez was at that time,
or a country Joe McDonald. His music wasn't necessarily political in nature.
Is that accurate? Well, some of it was covertly uh political, But
he did the Star Spangled banner. You know, you could hear bombs going
off and guns and babies crying and women's screaming and all that kind of stuff,
and you know that was a big political statement. And then he did
sounds like machine Gun about the Vietnam War and Isabella about the Vietnam War,
and you know, it was all through his music. He didn't give speeches
about get it, you know, stop the war and all that kind of
stuff, but at his concerts he made comments like free Bobby Seal, whether
this is dedicated to all the soldiers that are fighting in Vietnam or or fighting
for other things, or fighting within themselves. You know, he was pretty
non political, but he did. It did come out in his music and
some comments here and there, and just the statements, you know, the
things that he did made big statements. Like I said before, he had
a lot of white girlfriends. That was a statement. He made a big
statement with that. You know, without saying anything, just having a white
girlfriends would piss off someone like Jay Gohoover. I don't know if you know
this, but like, uh yeah, some years ago, a few years
ago, this woman did a book on Jayed Gohover and she found doubt that
he had black relatives. So he was a self hating black and uh,
he threatened some of these relatives that if they came forward and and said that
he had black relatives, that he would have them killed. And she did
this whole research about this in a book. So that was interesting, perhaps
perhaps of being frank for another day. Another conversation, Taby, what about
the future of again, it's more than just a film, as I said,
it's a series of films. Uh, what's where can people see it?
What is the future? Do you have planned for more festivals? Will
it go Netflix? What? What? What's what's going on with it?
What's the the immediate future look like? Well, I'm just talking to people
now and uh, I'd like to get on a streaming outlet and and get
distribution. So we're talking to people now and probably gonna do a screening in
the city for just industry people pretty soon. And yeah, that would be
that would be the plan. To get it on a Netflix or Hulu or
Showtime or paramount something like that would be good. But I know that the
Hendricks estate has been bad, bad than me for years. I shouldn't say
the estate. It's just a Jennie and and you know, they say they
make up stories about me and slander me and say I'm a con artist,
and all kinds of stuff like that, And and they tell people with film,
don't license anything to him, don't sell any footage or photos to him.
It's been going on for a long time, so that's one of the
obstacles that I'm dealing with. You know, I didn't pick an easy subject
matter. Is there any way people can see any clips of it now?
Can you give a website or anything? I know, as I said,
I had the privilege of seeing one of the segments at the Nayak Film Festival
recently. Is there anywhere else people can go to see some of it?
Some highlights, clips, trailers? No, not yet. I'm just trying
to keep it under wraps speak for obvious reasons that we discussed, because I
don't want to, you know, give it away so that give the state
more ammunition to attack me. It's better that they don't see any of it
until it's released officially, and you'll let us know when that day comes,
and we'll have you back on and we can talk about it some more.
And Jimmy Hendrix has been great. It'd be great. Love to I'd like
to thank David Kramer for his intelligent conversation Jimmy Hendrix a documentary. He is
the producer, writer, director, cameraman, et cetera. I know the
feeling, and we thank him for his intelligent conversation. Of course, we
offer special thanks to our listeners who take time to give us a voice in
their lives. Remember, we offer fresh topic every week. You catch us
whenever and wherever you get your favorite podcast that includes Apple, Spotify, iHeartRadio,
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Leave us a comment, and like us. We also ask that you
consider sharing being frank with others. I'm going to leave you, as usual
with two last little things, a slogan that we feel is appropriate for our
program, and this one comes from Jimi Hendrix himself and his probably most famous
he said, when the power of love overcomes the love of power, the
world will know peace. That's a misconceptions question here, Yes, explain while
you're there, Go ahead. He didn't really say that he wrote that song
with the power and that quote came from some else a long time ago,
but he never actually said that. A lot of people think he did because
he did that song with the power of soul, power of love. All
that so great. Thank you for clarifying that, David. We appreciate it.
That's great. That's why you're One other thing I wanted to say.
One other thing I wanted to say. You asked about what will people learn
or what will people take away or learn from your documentary. I was going
to say, there's a lot of life lessons in the documentary for people,
and I'll give you one of them, and that is, if you can
have aspirations of becoming a professional musician, you better be really careful because it's
a mind field out there, and the way that Hendricks got ripped off was
absolutely despicable. So you know, I know there's a lot of young kids
and they love music and they want it to be I mean, they want
to be a rock star. Just be careful. It's not all fun and
games. So that's how I think our engineer Neil Richter, who is also
a drummer by trade, is relating to what you're saying right there. Again,
we don't have video, but he's smiling and nodding away in the background
there. Let that be the final word. Guys, bring a little music
for you from my good friend David Snyder featuring Eric Lawrence, another good friend
on the saxophone from his album Echoes of the Masters. It's you left Me
in the dust and don't forget that. By the way, those guys are
going to be at the Turning Point in May, the legendary turning Point in
Piermont, with a great show. I'll be there, hopefully you can join
us too. In the meantime, Thank you so much for listening to Being
Frank, for Neil Richter and our guest David Kramer. I'm your host,
Frank Lebono, and we certainly hope to see you on the next Being Frank,
Where the only way to be is and as if a taste not happen
and every and this is Hudson River Radio dot com.