Nine to the Universe
Five jam sessions from 1969, edited and titled after the fact.
Nine to the Universe is a posthumous compilation album by American guitarist Jimi Hendrix. It was released in March 1980 in the US and in June 1980 in the UK. It was the third album of Hendrix recordings to be produced by Alan Douglas. The album contains five jam sessions, edited by Douglas. It reached number 127 on the Billboard 200 chart. Although the album has never been reissued or released on compact disc, four of the tracks have been re-released without Douglas's edits.
Quick Facts
- Artist
- Jimi Hendrix
- Released
- 1980
- Recorded
- March–May, August 1969
- Studio
- Record Plant & The Hit Factory, New York City
- Genre
- Progressive R&B; jazz fusion
- Label
- Polydor (UK); Reprise (US)
- Producer
- Alan Douglas
Lore & Background
The tracks on Nine to the Universe were recorded between March and August 1969 at the Record Plant and The Hit Factory in New York City. Unlike his previous efforts, producer Alan Douglas mostly retained the original backing tracks and musicians. However, he came up with the titles, since Hendrix did not give names to these jams. One instrumental was titled "Young/Hendrix", after organist Larry Young and another "Jimi/Jimmy Jam", after guitarist Jim McCarty. Bassist Dave Holland commented: "I'm not quite sure why I was called, but I was real happy to do it. It was a lot of fun and very informal. Nothing was really planned ... It was real loose, and Jimi seemed as if he was putting it together as he went." McCarty added: "None of that stuff was ever intended to be released ... To me it was embarrassing. I'm sure that Jimi would have said, 'You're out of your fucking mind!' and never let it happen. It was all about people trying to make a buck off of Jimi Hendrix."
Reader's Guide
In a contemporary review for The Village Voice, music critic Robert Christgau gave Nine to the Universe a "B+" and called it "bracing progressive R&B" showcasing Hendrix's most jazz-oriented improvisations. However, he questioned "whether tighter structures wouldn't have made [Hendrix] think harder and faster", while finding that Young, being the only jazz musician, sounded less "far out" than usual. Paul Evans gave it three-and-a-half out of five stars in The Rolling Stone Album Guide (1992) and said the ethics of Douglas' production were questionable but resulted in a fusion style in which Hendrix "sounds great", citing the album as the most "vital" of the Douglas-produced records. According to music scholar Craig Hansen Werner, along with Miles Davis' "Right Off" (1971) and the Sonny Sharrock albums Guitar (1986) and Seize the Rainbow (1987), Nine to the Universe was one of the few works that suggested the direction Hendrix and Davis would have explored had they worked together.
Track listing
Side one
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Nine to the Universe | 8:45 |
| 2 | Jimi/Jimmy Jam | 8:04 |
| Total length | 16:49 | |
Side two
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Young/Hendrix | 10:22 |
| 2 | Easy Blues | 4:30 |
| 3 | Drone Blues | 6:16 |
More in Albums & EPs
Elsewhere in Jimi Hendrix
Spotted an error? Know more?
Reader corrections go straight into our review queue. Suggest an edit · How this site is sourced