I ran across this today when reading info regarding ELP....
Before settling on Carl Palmer, they approached Mitch Mitchell of The Jimi Hendrix Experience; Mitchell was uninterested but passed the idea to Jimi Hendrix. Hendrix, tired of his band and wanting to try something different, expressed an interest in playing with the group. The British press, after hearing about this, speculated that such a supergroup would have been called HELP, or "Hendrix, Emerson, Lake & Palmer". Due to scheduling conflicts, such plans were not immediately realised, but the initial three planned a jam session with Hendrix after their second concert at the Isle of Wight Festival (their debut being in Plymouth Guildhall six days earlier), with the possibility of him joining. Hendrix died shortly thereafter, so the three pressed on as Emerson, Lake and Palmer.
Greg Lake made this comment on ELP's discussions with Hendrix:
"Yeah, that story is indeed true, to some degree...Mitch Mitchell had told Jimi about us and he said he wanted to explore the idea. Even after Mitch was long out of the picture and we had already settled on Carl, talk about working with Jimi continued. We were supposed to get together and jam with him around August or September of 1970, but he died before we could put it together."
Very good trivia about Mitch especially. The Hendrix rumours were heavily published, but I didn’t realize Mitch was the pivot. In retrospect, Carl Palmer with his formal training was a much better choice, but I sort’a wish Mitch had made the jump. He was never the same after Noel left.