On 2 September 1968, the Jimi Hendrix Experience released their cover of Bob Dylan's "All Along the Watchtower" as the lead single from Electric Ladyland, and it went on to become Hendrix's only US top 40 hit, peaking at No. 20 on the Billboard Hot 100. The recording is notable not just for its chart success but because Dylan himself later praised it so highly that he adopted Hendrix's arrangement for his own live performances, calling it a kind of tribute to the guitarist after his death.

The song originated on Dylan's John Wesley Harding album, released in December 1967, with Hendrix beginning his version the following January. The sessions proved fraught: bassist Noel Redding, frustrated by repeated retakes, quit before completion and was replaced first by Traffic's Dave Mason and later by Billy Cox, while producer Chas Chandler grew so exasperated that he left the Electric Ladyland sessions entirely and went uncredited on the album. Dissatisfied with Chandler's mixes and engineer Tony Bongiovi's overdubs, Hendrix spent three months remixing the track himself, ultimately blending 16 tracks into the final single, which Dylan issued as his own single that November.