Billy Cox turned down a slot in the Jimi Hendrix Experience to protect the guitar legend from racism

Billy Cox, who played with Jimi Hendrix in Band of Gypsies, as well as, prior to that, his short-lived group Gypsy Sun and Rainbows, recently revealed the fiery fate of Hendrix’s long-lost single-lipstick-pickup Danelectro Shorthorn “Betty Jean” electric guitar.

Now, in that same interview, presented on NAMM’s Remembering Jimi Hendrix podcast, the bass guitar player also explained why he turned down Hendrix’s offer to join him earlier in his career.

According to Cox, who knew Jimi from their time stationed together in Kentucky while serving in the US Army, Hendrix phoned him in the summer of 1966 to ask him to come to England and join him in a new band being assembled by his manager Chas Chandler – the band that would become the Experience.

But the bassist turned down Hendrix’s offer, explaining that his bass only had three strings and that he couldn’t afford to purchase an amp.

As Cox admits in the new interview, this was an excuse he came up with to protect Jimi from being the target of racism.

“I got a phone call from him, and he said, ‘This man is going to take me to Europe and make me a star, and I told him about you…and I want you to go,’ ” Cox recalled.

“I’ve told so many lies about this… well, it wasn’t a lie, I just didn’t tell the whole story… I said, ‘Jimi, I’m renting an amp, and I’ve still got my bass but it’s got three strings on… you go ahead and you make it.’ Because I knew that, possibly, with this segregated thing that was going on, I figured if I went, there’s a possibility, with me being black, he might not make it. But he did… he did real well, and I went on with my life.”

The full interview with Cox is available on the NAMM Music History Project podcast, which also features contributions from Hendrix producer Eddie Kramer.