Hudson River Radio dot Com. It beats listening to nothing. Oh my godness, Frank, Being Frank Frank, where the only way to be is Frank. 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 to come right after these brief commercial messages. Hudson River Radio dot com.
Check out The Angel Quest Show with psychic media and author Karen Noe. Karen covers spiritual topics such as near death experiences, reincarnation, life after death, how your thoughts create your reality, creating peace on Earth, and so much more. Check out The Angel Quest Show on Apple Podcasts. iHeart, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Bring a dash of green into your life. Check out the Many Shades of Green with Maxine, margat Rubin and Malcolm
Berman. Get informed about environmental issues and current events that affect us all. Pick a shade of green and raise your eco consciousness with the Many Shades of Green available on Apple Podcasts, iHeart, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Pudsonriverradio dot com. Welcome back to Being Frank, the Intelligent Conversation podcast. Thanks for sticking with us. I'm your host, Frank Ibuono. You know we bring our audience a fresh topic every week, usually premiering on
Thursdays. We stream from Hudson River Radio, which is located in beautiful and historic Stony Point, New York, where Neil Richter, the Mailman, is our engineer. But remember, you can catch Being Frank anywhere you get your favorite podcasts, that includes Apple, Spotify, iHeartRadio, and all the others. And because every Being Frank is archive, you can listen to any of our programs anytime you like. Find the link to Being Frank on the Hudson
River Radio Facebook page or at our website. Hudsonriverradio dot com. Just click on the icon and you're there. Listen to any program at any time. Leave us a comment, and please consider subscribing to the podcast and share us 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,
all the rest. Check us out on the Hudson River Radio Facebook page. 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.