Ernie Isley heading to the MACC for Maui Music & Food Experience concert Sept. 7
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When the Beatles first appeared on "The Ed Sullivan Show" in February 1964, 11-year-old Ernie Isley of the legendary Isley Brothers was watching the show with his brother Marvin. Between them on their mom's couch sat a musician who would later become an icon – Jimi Hendrix.
"There was no clap of thunder," Isley recalls. "You have no way of knowing that the person sitting on the couch at the time is going to be an electric guitar deity."
Years later, both Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr told Isley how the Isley Brothers had influenced the Beatles.
Heading to Maui to perform at the Maui Music & Food Experience concert at the MACC on Sept. 7, Isley has fond memories of Hendrix, when he lived in their family home in New Jersey for two years and toured and recorded with the Isley Brothers, between 1963 to 1965.
"It was obvious before the first rehearsal was over that he was the star of the band," Isley says. "He was polite, respectful, played guitar virtually all the time. He had the bedroom in the back and was never charged, and never charged for any meals that he ate in the house. He was the only member of the band that was given that privilege."
After recounting more memories of Hendrix's life with the Isleys, Ernie says, "let's fast forward. When 'It's Your Thing' was out in 1969, the Isley Brothers were going to do a festival show headlining at Yankee Stadium." They called Hendrix. "He said, 'I'd love to do it, but I have to do a show at this farm in upstate New York called the Woodstock Music Festival in August, and the promoters are concerned that if I do the show at Yankee Stadium, it might hurt ticket sales.'"
Ernie Isley's connection to Hendrix's music continues to this day. He has toured with the Experience Hendrix show playing lead guitar alongside Jimi's bassist Billy Cox. Back in the 1970s, the Isley Brothers released a brilliant medley of CSN&Y's protest song "Ohio" and Hendrix's "Machine Gun."
At the Maui show he says, "I think I'll be doing 'Methods to Love' and 'Manic Depression.' On the Hendrix tour, they had me opening the show with Billy Cox. I played guitar, Billy was on bass and he sang 'Stone Free.' The next song was 'Methods to Love' from the Band of Gypsys, and I did 'Manic Depression'."
With a career spanning over 7 decades, the Isley Brothers have enjoyed one of the longest, most influential, and most diverse careers in the pantheon of popular music. Still touring, in the last few years they have recorded songs with Beyonce, Snoop Dogg and Carlos Santana.
Their first hit "Shout," sold over a million copies in 1959, and their second was "Twist and Shout," which were both later covered by the Beatles.
Drumming with the Brothers from the age of 14, then switching to bass and then lead guitar, Ernie played bass on their huge hit, the Grammy winning "It's Your Thing." "It was my first recording session," he recalls. "It just blew up. To this day, it's the biggest 45 single that the Isley Brothers have ever had."
The group released many brilliant soul/funk rock flavored songs like "Fight the Power, Pts. 1 & 2," "Live It Up, Pts. 1 & 2," "Here We Go Again, Pts. 1 & 2," "Work to Do" (a later hit for the Average White Band), and "That Lady, Pts. 1 & 2," where Ernie's guitar shines. Their remarkable interpretation of Seals and Crofts' "Summer Breeze," featured a stunning guitar solo that likely influenced Prince.
About "That Lady," he explains, "when I hit the first note of the lead guitar, the music went from black and white to 3D Technicolor. I played it pretty much all the way through like it was a guitar instrumental for 45 minutes. I had one foot on earth and
the other foot was on Mount Olympus." Some folks assumed it was Hendrix playing the lead guitar. Darrell McNeill, author of the new book "3+3," on the Isleys, praises Ernie as "an heir apparent to Hendrix."
"That Lady" confounded their record label. The musicians were told, "we're trying to figure out how we would approach radio because you've got funk elements, you got dance elements, you got R&B elements, but you also have this lead guitar sound, which is unusual. What do we do?" It was a Top 10 hit.
Ernie came up with the lyrics for the protest song "Fight the Power" – in the shower. It inspired Public Enemy's song of the same title.
"I was humming different things, singing different things, 'time is truly wasting, there's no guarantee. Smile is in the making, fight the powers that be.' I jumped out of the shower, found a piece of paper, I'm dripping, and wrote that down."
Besides "Summer Breeze," they also released a terrific album of covers including Stephen Stills' "Love the One You're With," Bob Dylan's "Lay, Lady Lay" and Eric Burdon and War's "Spill the Wine."
The Isley's fans include Carlos Santana who recorded "Power of Peace" with the band in 2017. Santana told him, "Ernie, you're outstanding. You're a marvelous player."
And there are the Beatles. Performing on a benefit show which Paul McCartney attended, Ernie recalls, "he stood up and gave me a bear hug. He said, 'Ernie, if it were not for the Isley Brothers, the Beatles would still be in Liverpool.' We had a chance to get on stage together and for the first time, an Isley and a Beatle did 'Twist and Shout.'"
Another time he ran into Ringo Starr, "when we won a (Grammy) Lifetime Achievement Award in Los Angeles, in 2014. The Beatles also got one in 2014. I'm walking towards the stage, and I had to walk past Ringo. We had a chance to speak when it was all over.
"He said, 'you know, Ernie, the Isley Brothers, you guys helped us hit our stride.' The first song they did at Shea Stadium was 'Twist and Shout,' and they stopped the show. The Isley Brothers did that record in 1962."
Presented by the Hua Momona Foundation, the Maui Music & Food Experience, benefiting survivors of the August 2023 fires, will include a "Night at the Farm" intimate dinner at Hua Momona Farms on Sept. 5, a "Celebration at the Ritz-Carlton" gala at the Ritz-Carlton Maui, Kapalua on Sept. 6 (a two for one ticket deal is being offered for the Ritz celebration), and a concert at the MACC on Sept. 7, which will pay tribute to Hendrix and "Rainbow Bridge" in the Castle Theater. More information is available at: www.mauimusicandfoodexperience.org.