“This guy came up to me and said, ‘Hi, I’m Jimi Hendrix, can I sit in with your band?’ I said, ‘Well, I dunno – let’s go and find out’”: In June 1968, Jack Bruce came close to forming a band with Jimi Hendrix

Photo of Jack BRUCE; ID# WBLb 31, Jack Bruce, West, Bruce and Laing., Copenhagen. Rock guitarist Jimi Hendrix of the rock band 'The Jimi Hendrix Experience' performs onstage with a Gibson Flying V electric guitar .

For many years a double bass player influenced more by jazz and classical music than rock, Jack Bruce brought an acute melodic awareness to the bass guitar from the moment he picked one up. 

Classically trained at Scotland’s Royal Academy of Music, Bruce had been playing upright in London jazz clubs – but also listening to James Jamerson and “striving to play melodies … while maintaining the bass’ function as an anchor.”