Becoming Jimi Hendrix

September 15, 2010
As a boy growing up in Seattle, Jimi Hendrix and his guitar were inseparable. He even slept with it. And when his father objected to the young boy playing left-handedthe elder Hendrix called it the devils workJimi learned to play right-handed upside down without changing the strings. These are the kind of details one learns in Roby and Schreibers entertaining biography, which follows Hendrix from his troubled childhood in Seattle, his disastrous stint in the army (he refused to conform to regulations), and on to New York and London, where he died under rather mysterious circumstances. From his earliest days as a sideman in various bands, Hendrix was different, creating weird wailing sounds on his guitar, which often got him fired. They also examine his dark side; despite his typically gentle demeanor, Hendrix had a violent streak. When the black community rejected both his music and his flamboyant style of dress, Hendrix spent more time in Greenwich Village, where, inspired by the success of another iconoclast, Bob Dylan, he found acceptance. An insightful look at an iconic star.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2010, American Library Association.)