HENDRIX, JIMI
Steve Lukather considers Jimi Hendrix as one of the influences on his career. He started as a young boy playing the guitar, copying Hendrix' licks:Steve's mother presented him with a three-pickup Astro-Tone electric when he was ten. Armed with a Leo Krebs fuzztone and an Alamo amp, the boy kept busy copying solos from Jimi Hendrix' first albums and Eric Clapton's work with Cream. At eleven he obtained an imitation Les Paul guitar, joined a junior high power trio, and cut his first single. "We were playing Hendrix-type stuff," he laughs. "The drummer's father was an engineer, and he took us in the studios and recorded us. I was singing then, and I sounded like Michael Jackson. I don't even remember what we called the trio." During the next few years, Steve supplanted his knowledge of recording by playing on demo tapes.
Jimi Hendrix doubled a lot of stuff, like the rhythm parts in All Along the watchtower on Electric Ladyland and some stuff on Axis: Bold as love. Hendrix never doubled a whole rhythm part, but there would be parts where you can definitely hear it. He was one of my heroes, still is. I couldn't believe it when he made his first album in 1967. That's almost 20 years ago, and the vocabulary of what he played is still very relevant today. People are still stealing his stuff. He's still the guy. (Guitar Player, 1984)
"I was 10 years old when the first Hendrix album, Are You Experienced?, came out in ’67. Some older kid down the street was giving me guitar lessons and said you’ve got to listen to this record. I took it home, and from note one I was completely blown away. It was like alien music. That was my first rebellion-against-your-parents music. I thought, “I’ve offended my parents,” and that was the whole point of it. Then I got into the real nuts-and-bolts genius of the man, and how deep he was, and what a short life he lived, and how he gave us so much and grew so much and changed the whole face of the time. It was all kinds of music put into one. It was R&B, it was flipped-out new sounds, new recording techniques, everything." ((Musicplayer.com, September 2001)
"I tried to learn everything. I played his records a thousand times and examined the guitar parts. I'm still playing his songs. Why? Cause they are touching me. Every guitarist from 30 years of age and up must have been influenced by Hendrix. If not, he's lying or he's an idiot, hahaha. Jimi has set the standard that alot of us are still trying to achieve. (...) It's real stuff. It's no plastic garbage, it's not computerized. I really doubt wether the present rock music will be relevant after 30 years. Everything is so calculated and over-produced." (Gitarre & Bass, November 2002 - The Jimi Hendrix Special)
His dedication to Hendrix can also be noted live, as Luke likes to play some of Jimi's songs live. He also appeared several times at the dutch Jimi Hendrix
Tribute concert.
On records, he has recorded different Hendrix' tunes: