Few people know that Jimi Hendrix was an avid reader of science fiction, or that one of his most famous songs, Purple Haze, was inspired by a Philip Jose Farmer novel, Night of Light.
Farmer’s story concerns the planet Dante’s Joy, a world bombarded with strange solar radiation every seven years. The energy triggers changes in reality, often surreal and frightening.
The tale inspired Hendrix to jot down the original draft of Purple Haze. However, the original draft was an epic saga of interplanetary war around Neptune; Hendrix wrote many pages of lyrics before distilling them down to the legendary song we know today.
