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 I've got a humming bird and it hums so loud you'd think you were losing your mind April 22, 2009
C. CRADDOCK (Bakersfield)
Room Full of Mirrors was an excellent biography of Jimi Hendrix. Author Charles R. Cross conducted extensive interviews with everyone he could find who knew Jimi; and the story that emerges is one of a sensitive musician who couldn't handle his sudden fame, and was leading a wild life of excess that culminated in his tragic death from an accidental overdose of sleeping pills. His story is told very fairly, without being too judgmental, but also without white washing over Jimi's human faults and foibles.
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Way up in my tree I'm sitting by my fire
Wond'rin' where in this world might you be
And knowin' all the time you're still roamin' in the country side
Do you still think about me?
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Cross did an excellent job of sorting and filtering many conflicting accounts of the life of this complex artist. He didn't seem to have any particular axe to grind, but would take sides if he felt that one version of the story had more merit than another. For instance, the woman who was with Jimi when he died was not the most credible witness and Cross casts doubt on her account of Hendrix's final hours.
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Hurrah I awake from yesterday
alive but the war is here to stay
so my love Catherina and me
decide to take our last walk
through the noise to the sea
not to die but to be re-born
away from a world so tattered and torn....
forever...
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There are plenty of little scenes that illuminate just how a shy kid from Seattle became the madman genius guitar slingin' Voo Doo Child. Jimi decided he wanted to play guitar at a young age and would "practice" for hours, even though it was just a broom he was holding, pretending it was a guitar. Later, he would show just as much dedication with a guitar, playing it upside down because he was left handed. His father thought he should play it the standard way, and when his dad came home during the middle of Jimi's wood shedding he would have to flip it over. This versatility no doubt came in handy, as he later learned to play it with his teeth or behind his back.
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Oh! Move over, Rover
and let Jimi take over
Yeah, you know what I'm talking 'bout
Yeah, get on with it, baby
That's what I'm talking 'bout
Now dig this!
Ha!
Now listen, baby
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Seattle was a city of diverse ethnicity that exposed him to Black Music, but also primitive rock and roll like The Kingsmen, famed for a cover of Louie, Louie, that seminal rock and roll anthem. One of the local clubs where he got his start was called the Spanish Castle, and he would pen a song about it. Later, he joined the military and was stationed in the South. This led to him playing the R&B circuit and going out on the road, playing with groups such as Little Richard and the Isley Brothers. He picked up a lot of tricks and there were showdowns with great guitarists that Jimi Hendrix lost, but he took his defeats as inspiration, and developed his own style, based on the blues but at the same time transcending it.
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Blue are the life-giving waters taken for granted,
They quietly understand
Once happy turquoise armies lay opposite ready,
But wonder why the fight is on
But they're all bold as love, yeah; they're all bold as love
Yeah, they're all bold as love
Just ask the axis
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Woodstock, The Monterey Pop Festival, The Plaster Casters, London--it is all here in a Room Full of Mirrors. One of my favorite stories is one where Jimi goes back to his old High School--Garfield High--and asks to hold an assembly to address the students. He was unable to get a guitar, and found that without one he was too shy to speak much. The students were annoyed at this strange hippie, and could see no reason why they should've listened to anything he had to say. It is a very sad scene, but you can't help but wonder, if only he had a guitar, they would have heard him talking with it and known that he had a lot to say.
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If you can just get your mind together
then come across to me
We'll hold hands an' then we'll watch the sun rise
from the bottom of the sea
But first
Are You Experienced?
Ah! Have you ever been experienced?
Well, I have
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Charles R. Cross has written a compelling biography of Jimi Hendrix, and the only thing I can say bad about it is that I would have liked to have read much more about his guitar playing and music, but there are plenty of other books and DVDs that plumb the depths of that subject.
Are You Experienced? by Jimi Hendrix
Axis: Bold as Love by Jimi Hendrix
Electric Ladyland by Jimi Hendrix
Band of Gypsys by Jimi Hendrix
First Rays of the New Rising Sun by Jimi Hendrix
Guitar World -- How to Play the Best of the Jimi Hendrix Experiences Electric Ladyland (DVD) by Andy Aledort
Guitar World: How to Play The Jimi Hendrix Experience's Axis: Bold as Love by Andy Aledort
Heavier Than Heaven: A Biography of Kurt Cobain by Charles R. Cross
Hendrix: Setting the Record Straight by Edward E Kramer & John McDermott
Jimi Hendrix: Electric Gypsy by Harry Shapiro & Caesar Glebbeek
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Well, she's walking through the clouds,
With a circus mind that's running wild,
Butterflies and Zebras,
And Moonbeams and fairy tales.
That's all she ever thinks about.
Riding with the wind.
=========================
 Straightforward, Basic Facts Account April 6, 2009
Jym Cherry (Wheaton, IL United States)
Biography is a weird format, it is the only genre where the reader already knows the outcome, the death of the hero. Jimi Hendrix's death is one of the most famous of Rock `n' Roll deaths, the first of the triumvirate of legendary deaths of the 60's, Hendrix, Janis, and Jim Morrison, sort of Rock 'n' Roll trinity.
Charles Cross' first biography is the critically acclaimed Heavier Than Heaven, the biography of Kurt Cobain. What do Cobain and Hendrix have in common? They're both from Seattle. In Room Full of Mirrors Cross does a good job detailing Hendrix's life from the shocking poverty that he was born and raised in. While Jimi didn't have the opportunities of his youth that were present in contemporaries lives such as that of Jim Morrison, Hendrix and Morrison had one thing in common and it may have prepared them for the lifestyle as rock stars, and that was the experience of mobility and never living too long in one place. Morrison's father in the Navy moving the family from one assignment to the next. Hendrix's father trying to stay one step ahead of bill collectors and keep a home for his children may contributed to Jimi's feeling of being a part of a band of gypsies never staying too long in one place before moving on. Young Jimi had one thing going for him his belief in himself as a guitar player, even when that guitar was nothing more than a straw broom. In high school Hendrix finally got a guitar and played it, practicing every waking moment, he started getting into bands in high school and he learned from every player he came into contact with. After high school Hendrix joins the army but finds it doesn't suit him and soon gets himself discharged. Jimi soon starts years of gigging for every and any band he get into where he again learns every style of guitar playing and showmanship he encountered until he became the best guitar player we would come to know. There are no great revelations or secrets unveiled in Room Full of Mirrors nor is there any great insight into Hendrix's music or lyrics, it is just a straightforward telling of Hendrix's life, and at times, as in other biographies part of Hendrix's life seem as elusive as ever. The one thing cleared up are the details surrounding Hendrix's death and the myths propagated by Monica Danneman about Jimi being alive when the ambulance arrives and he chokes on his own vomit because of the carelessness of the ambulance attendants.
Also detailed are the legal skirmishes of the Hendrix family regarding Jimi's estate. Immediately, after Jimi's death lawsuits started flying, contracts were renegotiated, Noel Redding and Mitch Mitchell's interest in the Jimi Hendrix Experience were bought out, Al Hendrix, Jimi's father made an executor out of someone who ultimately couldn't be trusted, and finally Al cut out Jimi's brother Leon (who Al denied paternity of) and made an executor out of Janie Hendrix a girl Al adopted and only met Jimi a few times when she was a little girl and who has demonstrated to a court that she couldn't be trusted as an administrator and the estate now has a court appointed administrator of Jimi Hendrix's estate.
There are probably more definitive biographies of Hendrix out there, but Room Full of Mirrors is a solid if unsensational, and unflashy telling of Jimi Hendrix's life, you'll get the facts if not the whole story.
 Where is Mitch Mitchell? April 5, 2009
J. Scott Moore (Longmont, CO USA)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This is a very well written biography. Only a bit choppy in relation to time. I find a lot of bios have a tendency to lose the reader in time to the point that you are unable to relate the events of the book with real time. Cross does a nice job of keeping the reader up to date on when we are. It is written chronologically, as well.
The early years of Hendrix's life are a bit over done in my opinion. I really don't care about what grade he got in every single class, year after year. But in the process, Cross does get across his point; Jimi was never in one place for long as he was growing up.
The later years also seem well detailed to me, though other reviews seem to disagree when compared to other bios.
What I would have liked more of was details of Jimi working in the studio. Cross is content with telling us Jimi worked in the studio that week. Not enough. Hopefully Kramer's book can cover that.
But what Cross does do is provide you with an excellent idea of the personal relationship revolving around Jimi as he goes through life.
One major person missing was Mitch Mitchell. Clearly the author did not interview Mitchell for this book. While his interview list is impressive, I find it disturbing that a third of the Jimi Hendrix Experience was not a major source of this book. Of course he is mentioned prominently in the book, but was not sourced as Noel Redding was. I was hoping for an explanation in the acknowledgements, but there was none.
Over all a good read, seemed fairly even-handed and the sensationalism was kept to the level that was possible considering the subject!
Room Full Of Mirrors is EXCELLENT!!! February 16, 2009
Marvin (CA)
I have heard of this book for a while but finally read EVERY WORD like it was the Bible or something while on holiday in London recently. I finished it on the flight home. I'm not a professional critic or book reviewer. But I'll simplify it for everyone. This is a great book and a must read for all true Hendrix fans. I love him even more now. And I have also gained a keen respect for the author of this book. His book on Kurt Cobain is very good as well. You will know more about these people you love. And you will cherish them even more than you already do.
 Did not Capture His Talents At All January 22, 2009
Kathryn Protzko (NYC)
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
This just spoke of the bitterness and greed of everyone who knew him and how this escalated after he died in 1970 when everyone wanted to get what they felt what they were owed, profit wise from Jimi Hendrix & his estate. Such a talented young man, this did not honor his memory and shamefully left me saddened to find out that Jimi's mother was buried in the same cemetery, twelve years earlier and doesn't even have a decent headstone. just a sole brick with the last name "Mitchell" of her second husband whom she divorced . There remains no indication that the woman who lay there once gave birth to a rock and roll god!, It is so awful that this is so, i can't believe the gredyness of people, it's barbaric.
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