PBS Animates Jimi Hendrix’s Last Interview, It’s Purple And It’s Great

Jimi Hendrix died on September 18, 1970. A week before, on September 11, 1970, he gave an interview to the UK’s New Musical Express journalist Keith Altman from his suite at the Cumberland Hotel. Altman and the 27-year-old singer, songwriter, and guitarist who was able to do things unfathomable with the instrument discussed the latter’s wealth (he wanted more of it), songwriting process (he called it a “clash between reality and fantasy”), political sensibilities (he, at one point, was “getting ready to get into all that”), and anger release strategies (he preferred to let out all the rage on stage).

Almost 44 years later, David Gerlach, Patrick Smith, and the rest of the talented team behind the PBS digital series Blank on Blank

set the interview to animation. The result is an informative and entertaining six-minute-or-so look and listen into the soon-to-be legend’s life, colored in a very appropriate hue of purple haze.

This isn’t Blank on Blank’s first animated interview of an incredibly famous individual. Gerlach, Smith, and company honored Maurice Sendak with an animation back in June 2013 (a year after he passed away) and have done so for other notables like Jerry Garcia, Kurt Kobain, Ray Charles, Tupac Shakur, Grace Kelly, and more every couple of weeks since the show’s inception in May 2012.

If you aren’t subscribed to the show’s YouTube channel already, you should be.