A crayon drawing has yet again surfaced of a 12-year-old Jimi Hendrix depicting the legendary Elvis Presley after seeing him perform live in concert. Jimi Hendrix’s humiliating paycheck previously stunned the fans.
Jimi Hendrix drew Elvis Presley
It is evident that with fame and icon status comes fortune. However, it’s not always a given. If such an artist is mishandled by labels, management and other officials who cover the business side of music, the money can quickly dry up.
And as Pete Townshend said in a interview with NME, The Who were certainly subject to their share of mismanagement and business executives taking excess royalties in their day. He recalls an encounter he had with late guitar icon Jimi Hendrix during the final two weeks of his life.
“I saw him in LA in the last two weeks of his life,” he remembers. “He was happy, he was really nice to me, and he hadn’t always been in the past. I said, ‘How you doing?’ and he said, ‘Pete, I’m broke.’ He was huge, and he was broke.
Townshend adds, though, that he was never in the business for the money. “I lived in a little house in Twickenham by the Thames, I was happy to be by the water. I had one car. I had a tiny little studio, I was really happy. I had a beautiful wife, lovely kids, great friends and never wanted for anything really, except some time to myself and some time to have with my family.
Asked whether it still makes sense for established artists to make new albums, Townshend replies: “Haha! It’s never been about the money. The Who never made any money from fucking records anyway. Our managers were criminals. I’d never seen a Who royalty statement prior to our first audit, which we did while we were making Quadrophenia.