“Well, I got this guitar, and I learned how to make it talk,” sings Bruce Springsteen in his iconic “Thunder Road.” No knock on Bruce, who plays his instrument masterfully, but if that line applies to anyone, it’s Jimi Hendrix. He could make a guitar talk, sing, dance, or fly off into outer space, and he demonstrated all that in mid-1967 with his appearance at the Monterey International Pop Festival and his group’s debut album, Are You Experienced?

Having heard his startling instrumental pyrotechnics at that event and on that LP, fans had a sense of what to expect and were perhaps a bit less astonished by the time the Jimi Hendrix Experience’s sophomore LP came out around the end of 1967. Half a century later, though, Axis: Bold as Love still sounds terrific. Granted, the cover blurb on a 1990s reissue that called this record “the pivot which connects all music that ever was with all music that will ever be” is hyperbole. But the LP is loaded with high points and represents an important chapter in Hendrix’s musical history.

Like the debut album, it features short, tightly constructed songs, all but two of which clock in at less than four minutes. As Hendrix himself noted, however, the sophomore LP has a “prettier…more gentle” sound than its predecessor. Highlights include “Up from the Skies,” a jazzy sci-fi tale that employs Hendrix’s wah-wah pedal; the psychedelic “Castles Made of Sand,” the Indian music–influenced “Little Wing,” the funk-infused “Little Miss Lover,” and the bluesy “If 6 Was 9,” where he waves his “freak flag high.”

You can take a deep dive into this material, thanks to a new, well-assembled box called Bold as Love—The Axis: Bold as Love Sessions, which includes four CDs, a Blu-ray disc, and a 44-page booklet with photos and liner notes by David Fricke. Discs One and Two feature stereo and mono mixes of the original album, both with audio remastered from the original master tapes.

That second disc, like many mono mixes, is likely to interest only completists and other fanatical fans, but Discs Three and Four should garner more attention. They contain 40 tracks recorded in 1967, most of which are previously unreleased. They include alternate takes, demos, and alternate mixes of songs from the first and second albums, as well as several versions of “Burning of the Midnight Lamp” from the then-unreleased third LP, Electric Ladyland. Also featured are a dozen live tracks, most of which were broadcast in Sweden and included in a now out-of-print 1991 box called Stages.

The set’s Blu-ray disc contains Dolby Atmos and uncompressed stereo and mono mixes of the original album. But unlike the Blu-ray in a 2018 box devoted to Electric Ladyland, this one does not offer a 5.1 mix, which is unfortunate, since there are probably still more people with surround-sound equipment than with Dolby Atmos.

Be that as it may, this is an excellent package, containing lots that Hendrix fans will savor.

Also Noteworthy

Bobby Charles, Last Train to Memphis. While it’s safe to say that most musicians hope to climb the ladder from obscurity to success to superstardom, there are occasional exceptions. Fred Neil and Bobbie Gentry come to mind, as does Louisiana’s Bobby Charles, who quit the business after releasing a handful of fine LPs and writing great songs for many artists, including “Walking to New Orleans,” which gave Fats Domino a Top 10 hit in 1960, and “The Jealous Kind,” which has been covered by such artists as Joe Cocker, Ray Charles, and Delbert McClinton. “I never wanted to be a star,” Charles once said. “I’ve got enough problems, I promise you. If I could make it just writing, I’d be happy.”

You’ll be glad he didn’t only write, however, when you hear this reissued album, which first appeared in 2004, six years before his death. It includes a 15-track collection of material recorded over three decades, plus a 19-song bonus CD with most of the contents of two out-of-print earlier LPs, 1994’s Wish You Were Here Right Now and 1998’s Secrets of the Heart.

The guest list on Last Train to Memphis suggests how many of Charles’s contemporaries admire his work. It includes McClinton and Domino as well as Sonny Landreth, Clarence “Frogman” Henry, Maria Muldaur, Neil Young, and Willie Nelson. Another fan is Bob Dylan, who once observed that “it’s a sin” Charles was more successful as a songwriter than a singer, “because he’s a hell of a singer. He’s got one of the most melodious voices ever transmuted into a piece of vinyl.” Amen.

Dr. John, Live at the Village Gate. The late Dr. John released about a dozen live albums, so this two-CD set doesn’t exactly address a shortage. That said, the previously unavailable 1988 New York show captures the essence of the New Orleans–based artist and features an excellent backup band.

Though the 94-minute, 12-song set includes neither of Dr. John’s biggest singles, it features consistently fine material culled from multiple portions of his vast discography. Among the bluesy R&B high points are its three final numbers: “Mama Roux,” a song that appeared on the singer’s 1968 debut LP; a cover of “Georgia on My Mind”; and the self-penned, nearly 17-minute “Mardi Gras Day,” which evokes the celebratory spirit of that event.

Nina Simone, A Single Woman: The Complete Elektra Recordings. Nina Simone’s voice is as rich and powerful as ever on A Single Woman, which appeared in 1993 and turned out to be the jazz vocalist’s last album. Recorded with an arguably unnecessarily large 50-piece orchestra, the 10-track set features standards such as Mack Gordon and Harry Warren’s “The More I See You” and Leo Robin and Ralph Rainger’s “If I Should Lose You,” as well as several numbers from Rod McKuen, including the title cut.

At least as interesting are many of the recordings from the Single Woman sessions that didn’t make it onto the 1993 album, all of which are included here. Among them are covers of Bob Dylan’s “The Times They Are A-Changin’,” Paul McCartney’s “The Long and Winding Road,” Bob Marley’s “No Woman, No Cry,” and Prince’s “Sign o’ the Times.”

If you have the 2006 reissue that augmented the original program with seven of those outtakes, you probably have all you need, because this new release adds only three brief alternate versions and a one-minute instrumental. But if you’re a fan and don’t have the 1993 LP or the previous reissue, put this set on your buy list.