Mitch Mitchell R.I.P.

It caused a twinge of sadness when I heard the news that Mitch Mitchell had passed away at the age of 62 in Portland, Oregon on Wednesday. He was a great rock drummer who helped bring out the best in Jimi Hendrix, playing and recording with him right up until the end of his tragically short life.

One of my favorite Hendrix songs ever recorded was an instrumental piece titled "Beginnings", written by Mitch Mitchell, that is on the now long out of print record album War Heroes. (I still have the vinyl and love to turn it up and shake the walls down).

All the members of the Experience are now dead (Jimi in 1970 and Noel in 2003). I hope that they are having one helluva of a raucous reunion somewhere in the heavens above.

After all the jacks are in their boxes
And the clowns have all gone to bed
You can hear happiness staggering on down the street
Footsteps dressed in red
And the wind whispers Mary

A broom is drearily sweeping
Up the broken pieces of yesterdays life
Somewhere a queen is weeping
Somewhere a king has no wife
And the wind, it cries Mary

The traffic lights, they turn blue tomorrow
And shine their emptiness down on my bed
The tiny island sags down stream
cause the life that lived,
Is dead
And the wind screams Mary

Will the wind ever remember
The names it has blown in the past?
And with this crutch, its old age and its wisdom
It whispers no, this will be the last
And the wind cries Mary

Good night boys. Hope y'all have a good gig with lots of free drinks on the house. Say hello to Muddy and Janis for me.