Dear listeners,
I’m a sucker for any documentary that features scenes of people at a recording studio’s mixing board, isolating tracks from a great, intricately layered song.* Over the weekend, I watched a new film that, I am happy to report, features plenty of such footage: “Electric Lady Studios — A Jimi Hendrix Vision,” a recently released documentary that charts the origins of the famed, still vital Greenwich Village landmark.
Located at 52 West 8th Street and formerly an avant-garde nightclub, the property that would become Electric Lady was purchased by Jimi Hendrix and his manager in 1968. Over the next two years, they poured somewhere around $1 million of their own money into its construction. (When the cash flow dried up, Hendrix would go play some live gigs and return with enough dough to pay the contractors.) Hendrix initially dreamed up Electric Lady as his own personal recording studio, a place where he and his friends could experiment freely without incurring exorbitant hourly rates. But, tragically, Hendrix did not live long enough to use it much at all. Construction was finally completed in August 1970; Hendrix died, at 27, on Sept. 18 of that year.
Word had already gotten out that Electric Lady was special, combining state-of-the-art technology with a groovy atmosphere that made it a more comfortable place to hang out than most cramped, sterile recording studios. Thanks to some early bookings by marquee artists like Carly Simon, Led Zeppelin and Stevie Wonder, Electric Lady managed to stay afloat in those precarious first years after Hendrix’s death. More than 50 years later, it has survived ownership changes, gentrification and huge shifts in recording technology, remaining a crucial link between popular music’s past and present. Today, it’s arguably as busy as it’s ever been: Taylor Swift, Zach Bryan and Sabrina Carpenter are just a few stars who have recently laid down tracks there.
Today’s playlist traces Electric Lady’s decades-long history via nine very different songs recorded within its hallowed walls. I’ve arranged them in chronological order, so you can gradually hear the way the sounds of pop music have changed over time. I hope that you’ll also hear certain echoes between now and then — similarities in the soft-rock confessions of Simon and Swift, or the genre-blurring explorations of Wonder and Frank Ocean.
These are, of course, just a sampling of the thousands and thousands of songs that have been recorded at Electric Lady throughout the years. Next time you find yourself scouring a favorite LP’s liner notes or Wikipedia credits, don’t be too surprised if you see that familiar address.
This is our place, we make the rules,
Lindsay
* (The Fleetwood Mac episode of “Classic Albums” where Lindsey Buckingham pulls up individual vocal and instrumental tracks from “Rumours” is my personal gold standard.)
Listen along while you read.
1. Jimi Hendrix: “Dolly Dagger”
This psychedelic rocker is not only one of the first songs ever tracked at Electric Lady, but also one of the few songs Hendrix got to record there, making it a tantalizing glimpse of what could have been: There’s a looseness and a spaciousness in the mix that sets it apart from Hendrix’s earlier recordings. In the documentary, the producer and engineer Eddie Kramer recalls that “Dolly Dagger” was created in its entirety as a jam session on the floor of Studio A. “It’s a point,” he says, “where Jimi has total creative control.”
2. Carly Simon: “That’s the Way I’ve Always Heard It Should Be”
Slotted into some studio time while Hendrix was on tour, the then up-and-coming singer-songwriter Carly Simon was one of the first artists to record at Electric Lady, where she and Kramer tracked the entirety of her star-making 1971 debut album.
3. Stevie Wonder: “Superstition”
Seeking to stretch his musical imagination beyond the confines of the Motown formula, Stevie Wonder made Electric Lady the locus of his early 1970s creative liberation — the place where he recorded much of “Music of My Mind,” “Innervisions” and his 1972 declaration of independence “Talking Book.” That album’s associate producer, Robert Margouleff, has recalled how the spaciousness of Studio A contributed to the spontaneous composition of one of Wonder’s greatest songs. “We were at Electric Lady,” he told Jon Pareles for a package commemorating the album’s 50th anniversary. “Malcolm [Cecil, co-producer] and I had set up every instrument that we thought Steve could use in a big circle in the studio: the acoustic piano, the Rhodes, the Clavinet, the synthesizer. Everything was always all plugged in and playable immediately. Steve could move from instrument to instrument with ease.”
4. David Bowie: “Fame”
In early 1975, shortly after his notorious “lost weekend” era, John Lennon met up with his pal David Bowie for some free-form jamming at Electric Lady. The result was this wry, funky, soon-to-be single from Bowie’s next album, “Young Americans,” on which Lennon — whose backing falsetto can be heard throughout — received a writing credit.
5. Patti Smith: “Break It Up”
In her memoir “Just Kids,” Patti Smith writes about attending Electric Lady’s opening party in late August 1970 and meeting Hendrix there. “He spent a little time with me on the stairs,” she writes, “and told me his vision of what he wanted to do with the studio.” Though Hendrix didn’t live to see that vision of communal musical experimentation through, Smith would contribute to it five years later when she recorded her raw, kinetic debut album, “Horses,” there.
6. The Roots featuring Erykah Badu and Eve: “You Got Me”
In the late 1990s, a loose collective of hip-hop and neo-soul musicians who called themselves the Soulquarians — including the Roots, Common, Erykah Badu and D’Angelo — claimed Electric Lady as their home base. An outpouring of fresh, imaginative music emerged from freewheeling studio jam sessions, often organized by the Roots’ drummer, Questlove. Among the classic albums recorded there during the Soulquarians era were D’Angelo’s “Voodoo,” Badu’s “Mama’s Gun” and the Roots’ incisive 1999 album “Things Fall Apart,” on which this track appears.
7. Frank Ocean: “Ivy”
Few albums from the past decade have embraced Hendrix’s vision of genre fluidity and boundless ambition as wholeheartedly as Frank Ocean’s 2016 epic, “Blonde.” The earliest sessions for what would become Ocean’s masterpiece took place in the creatively generative environs of — where else? — Electric Lady Studios.
8. Taylor Swift: “Lover”
The prolific and ubiquitous pop producer Jack Antonoff’s penchant for recording at Electric Lady has had a major impact on the studio’s popularity with a current generation of stars. In recent years, he has recorded there with Lorde, Lana Del Rey, St. Vincent and a certain world-conquering pop musician who is often photographed on West 8th Street. This dreamy title cut from her 2019 album “Lover” is one of many songs that Swift has recorded at the studios — including some of her rerecorded “Taylor’s Version” tracks.
9. Sabrina Carpenter: “Please Please Please”
Finally, the most recent No. 1 hit recorded at Electric Lady is this current, Antonoff-produced smash from the winkingly witty Sabrina Carpenter. “I know I have good judgment, I know I have good taste,” she sings at the beginning of this rippling synth-pop jam. Of course she does: She recorded at Electric Lady.
The Amplifier Playlist
“9 Great Songs Recorded at Electric Lady Studios” track list
Track 1: Jimi Hendrix, “Dolly Dagger”
Track 2: Carly Simon, “That’s the Way I’ve Always Heard It Should Be”
Track 3: Stevie Wonder, “Superstition”
Track 4: David Bowie, “Fame”
Track 5: Patti Smith, “Break It Up”
Track 6: The Roots featuring Erykah Badu and Eve, “You Got Me”
Track 7: Frank Ocean, “Ivy”
Track 8: Taylor Swift, “Lover”
Track 9: Sabrina Carpenter, “Please Please Please”
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