Venues: AMC Empire (234 42nd Street, NY 10002) & Landmark Sunshine (143 E Houston Street, NY 10002)
Date: September 26, 2014
Ticket Phones: AMC Empire: 212-398-2597 & Landmark Sunshine: 212-260-7289
When filmgoers watch JIMI: All is By My Side, which opens on September 26 in 16 American cities, they will explore musical and narrative nuances rarely discussed in conversations about Jimi Hendrix’s career. The film, which stars André Benjamin (Outkast) and Imogen Poots (28 Weeks Later), was written by Oscar-winner and directed by John Ridley (12 Years a Slave). Ridley tapped Grammy-award-winning music producer Danny Bramson (Almost Famous, Lord of the Rings) as producer and music designer and the two of them fastidiously interpreted the soundscape of the era in a way that will tickle music buffs of the period.
“The film takes place in that lost or underserved year in Jimi’s life,” explains Bramson. “We were well aware of the Hendrix Estate’s long standing reluctance to allow any of Jimi’s original songs for an unauthorized Hendrix themed film. Thus, we never sought out Jimi’s hits that came once he departed Heathrow for the Monterey Pop Festival. The musically fertile environment of John Ridley’s story allowed me to interpret Jimi’s development from playing second lead guitar with Curtis Knight in New York then forming his first group and gigging afternoon performances at the Café Wha?, onto his arrival in London at the height of it’s musical enthrallment with the indigenous American Blues. With the Hendrix standard songs out of the equation, we chose a musical design as an interpretation of Jimi’s development as a guitarist principally, and the English musical and cultural zeitgeist that informed, inspired, and propelled him. The creative challenge was staggering, underscored with the incessant personal responsibility to get it right.”
