Drugs and alcohol

In July 1962, after Hendrix was discharged from the U.S. Army, he entered a small club in Clarksville, Tennessee. Drawn in by live music, he stopped for a drink and ended up spending most of the $400 he had saved. He explained: "I went in this jazz joint and had a drink. I liked it and I stayed. People tell me I get foolish, good-natured sometimes. Anyway, I guess I felt real benevolent that day. I must have been handing out bills to anyone that asked me. I came out of that place with sixteen dollars left."^[254] According to the authors Steven Roby and Brad Schreiber: "Alcohol would later be the scourge of his existence, driving him to fits of pique, even rare bursts of atypical, physical violence."^[255]

Like most acid-heads, Jimi had visions and he wanted to create music to express what he saw. He would try to explain this to people, but it didn't make sense because it was not linked to reality in any way.

—Kathy Etchingham^[256]

While Roby and Schreiber assert that Hendrix first used LSD when he met Linda Keith in late 1966, according to the authors Harry Shapiro and Caesar Glebbeek, the earliest that Hendrix is known to have taken it was in June 1967, while attending the Monterey Pop Festival.^[257] According to Hendrix biographer Charles Cross, the subject of drugs came up one evening in 1966 at Keith's New York apartment; when one of Keith's friends offered Hendrix acid, a street name for lysergic acid diethylamide, Hendrix asked for LSD instead, showing what Cross described as "his naivete and his complete inexperience with psychedelics".^[258] Before that, Hendrix had only sporadically used drugs, with his experimentation limited to cannabis, hashish, amphetamines and occasionally cocaine.^[258] After 1967, he regularly smoked cannabis and hashish, and used LSD and amphetamines, particularly while touring.^[259] According to Cross, by the time of his death in September 1970, "few stars were as closely associated with the drug culture as Jimi".^[260]

Substance abuse and violence

Hendrix would often become angry and violent when he drank too much alcohol or when he mixed alcohol with drugs.^[261] His friend Herbie Worthington explained: "You wouldn't expect somebody with that kind of love to be that violent ... He just couldn't drink ... he simply turned into a bastard".^[262] According to journalist and friend Sharon Lawrence, Hendrix "admitted he could not handle hard liquor, which set off a bottled-up anger, a destructive fury he almost never displayed otherwise".^[263]
In January 1968, the Experience travelled to Sweden for a one-week tour of Europe. During the early morning hours of the first day, Hendrix became engaged in a drunken brawl in the Hotel Opalen, in Gothenburg, smashing a plate-glass window and injuring his right hand, for which he received medical treatment.^[262] The incident culminated in his arrest and release, pending a court appearance that resulted in a large fine.^[264]
After the 1969 burglary of a house Hendrix was renting in Benedict Canyon, California, and while he was under the influence of drugs and alcohol, he punched his friend Paul Caruso and accused him of the theft. He then chased Caruso away from the residence while throwing stones at him.^[265] A few days later, one of Hendrix's girlfriends, Carmen Borrero, required stitches after he hit her above her eye with a vodka bottle during a drunken, jealous rage.^[262]

Canadian drug charges and trial

Main article: Canadian drug charges and trial of Jimi Hendrix

On May 3, 1969, while Hendrix was passing through customs at Toronto International Airport, authorities detained him after finding a small amount of what they suspected to be heroin and hashish in his luggage.^[266] Four hours later, he was formally charged with drug possession and released on $10,000 bail. He was required to return on May 5 for an arraignment hearing.^[267] The incident proved stressful for Hendrix, and it weighed heavily on his mind during the seven months that he awaited trial, which took place in December of that year.^[266] For the Crown to prove possession they had to show that Hendrix knew the drugs were there.^[268] During the jury trial he testified that a fan had given him a vial of what he thought was legal medication, which he put in his bag not knowing what was in it.^[269] He was acquitted of the charges.^[270] Mitchell and Redding later revealed that everyone had been warned about a planned drug bust the day before flying to Toronto; both men also stated they believed that the drugs had been planted in Hendrix's bag without his knowledge.^[271]