It features "Spanish Castle Magic" and "Little Wing", two Hendrix compositions that draw on his roots performing with rhythm and blues bands and would remain in his live repertoire throughout his career.
Following the completion of Are You Experienced at the end of April 1967, the Jimi Hendrix Experience continued their schedule of regular recording sessions, returning to Olympic Studios in London on May 4 to begin composing material for a follow-up LP.
[3] During a session the following day, Hendrix and Mitchell improved "Section B", now titled "Symphony of Experience", by re-recording most of their guitar and drum parts.
As an additional oddity, Hendrix played a recorder on the track, achieving what they considered a satisfactory sound despite his complete lack of formal training with the instrument.
Hendrix had been curious about a harpsichord that was stored in the facility's Studio A, so on this day he sat at the instrument and began writing "Burning of the Midnight Lamp", a song that became the fourth UK single for the Experience.
[10] They devoted the session to a new Hendrix song titled "Cat Talking to Me", recording 17 takes before deciding that the second was the superior version, to which they added guitar and percussion overdubs after Kramer prepared a reduction mix.
Although they worked on "Burning of the Midnight Lamp" and a new Hendrix composition, "The Stars That Play with Laughing Sam's Dice", they abandoned the inferior recordings.
[16] Axis: Bold As Love's scheduled release date was almost delayed when Hendrix lost the master tape of side one of the LP, leaving it in the back seat of a London taxi.
[17] With the deadline looming, Hendrix, Chas Chandler, and engineer Eddie Kramer remixed most of side one in a single overnight session, but they could not match the quality of the lost mix of "If 6 Was 9".
[17] Kramer was patient with Hendrix, who often demanded numerous re-takes; however, by October 1967, Chandler had grown weary of the guitarist's perfectionism.
[22] Mitchell commented: "Axis was the first time that it became apparent that Jimi was pretty good working behind the mixing board, as well as playing, and had some positive ideas of how he wanted things recorded.
[30] "If 6 Was 9", the last song on side one, is the album's longest track; some of the percussive effects were created by Gary Leeds (from the Walker Brothers) and Graham Nash stomping their feet.
[32][33] Hendrix composed the album's title track and finale around two verses and two choruses, during which he pairs emotions with personas, comparing them to colors.
[37] Shadwick described the composition as "possibly the most ambitious piece on Axis, the extravagant metaphors of the lyrics suggesting a growing confidence" in Hendrix's songwriting.
[37] The album cover depicts Hendrix and the Experience as various forms of Vishnu, incorporating a painting of the musicians by Roger Law, from a photo-portrait by Karl Ferris.
[41] Melody Maker journalist Nick Jones described the artwork as a "beautiful fold out package" that compensated for the "very poor presentation" of Are You Experienced.
Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, he said it showed Hendrix "with a lot of freaky looking Indian cats and gods, sages and one guy with an elephant's trunk for a nose or something!
[47] Track released Axis: Bold as Love in the UK on December 1, 1967, where it peaked at number five and spent 16 weeks on the charts.
[60] In his preview of the album for Rolling Stone, Nick Jones described it as "at times shatteringly beautiful" and highlighted "Spanish Castle Magic".
[42] Reviewing Axis in the same publication, Jim Miller hailed it as "the refinement of white noise into psychedelia ... the finest voodoo album that any rock group has produced to date".
[55] AllMusic's Cub Koda considered it a demonstration of Hendrix's "remarkable growth and depth" as a songwriter, utilizing Curtis Mayfield-like soul guitar work, "Dylanesque lyrical imagery, and Fuzz Face hyperactivity to produce yet another side to his grand psychedelic musical vision".