Exclusive Audio: Jimi Hendrix Covers Bob Dylan's 'Tears Of Rage'

Click to listen to Jimi Hendrix's Tears Of Rage.

Years before Jimi Hendrix became a superstar when he set his guitar on fire at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967, he was a session guitarist for R&B legends like the Isley Brothers, Little Richard and Don Covay. West Coast Seattle Boy, a new four-disc set that traces Hendrix's entire career, devotes its first CD to the fascinating songs that show how Hendrix learned his craft. The rest of the collection consists of unreleased versions of familiar songs like "Fire" and "Are You Experienced," alongside obscurities like "Mastermind" and "In From The Storm."

Read David Fricke on Hendrix's last days and lost music

Most interesting is this tender cover of Bob Dylan and The Band's classic "This Wheel's On Fire" — which you can exclusively hear here. Also, check out this exclusive video for an alternate version of 1967's "Love Or Confusion."

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Song Stories

“All Along the Watchtower”

The Jimi Hendrix Experience | 1968

Jimi Hendrix got hold of Bob Dylan's early John Wesley Harding tapes and in late 1967 recorded a version of "All Along the Watchtower" with the Experience in London. Dissatisfied with that first development, Hendrix brought those tapes with him to New York in early 1968 when he began work on Electric Ladyland. Eddie Kramer, Hendrix's engineer at the time, told Rolling Stone that Hendrix "was still looked upon by his basically white audience as the mammoth black guitar hero. There was a constant fight within him to expand himself." Hendrix's successful take on Dylan's work has long been recognized by the songwriter. "I liked Jimi Hendrix's record of this and ever since he died I've been doing it that way," Dylan wrote in the liner notes to his Biograph box set. "Strange how when I sing it, I always feel it's a tribute to him in some kind of way."

More Song Stories entries »

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