Why Did Jimi Hendrix Hate Jim Morrison?
- by Sam Kemp
While the 1960s may have been the age of superstar collaborations, it was by no means the era of friendly camaraderie. The golden age of rock is riddled with stories of bitter rivalry, backstabbing, and the occasional drunken brawl.
Two of the scene’s most prominent figures, Jimi Hendrix and Jim Morrison, were guilty of all three of these things. But why did they hate each other so much? Well, the answer lies in the jam session held back in 1968.
The Summer of Love may have been in full swing when Hendrix and Morrison met on stage at the uber-cool New York club The Scene, but peace and love was certainly not on the menu. A number of famous heads were in the audience that night, including Janis Joplin. Also in the crowd was Lester Chambers, vocalist of The Chamber brothers. As he recalled: “We were the house band at the Cheetah club, just a few blocks away on Broadway. When we finished at the Cheetah we would walk over to the Steve Paul Scene. You would come in off the street, go down four or five steps and you were in the club. It was a small space, maybe a hundred people at the most, so you got to mingle with whoever was there: John Lennon, Johnny Winter, Buddy Miles; if Janis Joplin was in town she’d be there; Al Kooper of the Blues Project was down there a lot.”
