Welcome to the pond

For today's Take Me Back Tuesday, I'm going to go back in a direction of my own choosing. These are today's questions for that meme:

In honour of the Steeler's win, this week is all about three things:

Football. Pittsburgh. Steel. (or for those punny enough...stealing)

Name three songs involving one of the three categories above.
Name three artists involving one of the three categories above.
Name three albums involving one of the three categories above.

Well, I don't know ANY songs, artists or albums dealing with any of those things! So I'm going to make up my own question so I'll have something to post. Actually, this is going to be in a Top Five On Friday format, but who cares?

Top Five Funkiest Jimi Hendrix Songs

I'm not going to define funky for you, because it's something you feel instead of something you describe. I'll just say that each of these songs had a certain swagger to them that was missing from, say, "Purple Haze."

1) "Message To Love" from Band Of Gypsys or Isle Of Wight. This song has one of Hendrix's best riffs, in my opinion. Jimi was a man who had many great riffs, but this is one of his funkiest of all time. You also have to love the little funk breakdown near the end of the song (right before he sings "everybody love a lot").

2) "Little Miss Lover" from Axis: Bold As Love. When you combine the dirty wah-wah riff and Hendrix's full-of-sex-and-attitude vocals, you get his first true funky song. "If Six Was Nine" from the same album had its moments of funkiness, but the noodling on guitar at the end keeps it from being as funky as "Little Miss Lover."

3) "Dolly Dagger" from the First Rays Of The New Rising Sun compilation (and a previous L.P., I'm not sure which one). It's all about the guitar riff here. Hendrix puts away the driving rock sounds in favor of a laid-back, sexy, urban flavor.

4) "Gypsy Eyes" from Electric Ladyland. Mitch Mitchell's forward-driving drumming is quite unlike anything found on any other Experience song, and that's just the beginning. Hendrix's choppy, faded, gritty riffing foreshadows the sounds he'd create for his later songs. His vocals, meanwhile, are quite funky and pack a nice punch. This song is the evolution of "Foxey Lady" and replaces the heavily-distorted sounds on that track for layers of guitars and effects.

5) "Who Knows" from Band Of Gypsys. Say what you want about Buddy Miles' nonesensical screaming in the middle of the song, but you cannot deny the power of Hendrix's pounding, grooving guitar riff. The lyrics aren't much, but the guitar and bass form a smooth, relaxing, flat out FUNKY foundation for the rest of the track to build upon. After one listen to this, you won't be able to get that riff out of your head. It just screams "This is NOT the Jimi Hendrix Experience!"

Honorable Mention: "Power Of Soul" from Band Of Gypsys, and much of what's on First Rays Of The New Rising Sun. If Hendrix had lived into the seventies, I believe he would have evolved into a funk guitarist. Maybe he would have even joined Funkadelic instead of Eddie Hazel. Whatever the case, Jimi was funky before the word funky meant anything.