Tony's Music Blog

In the preface to A Room Full of Mirrors: A Biography of Jimi Hendrix, the author Charles Cross bemoans the mythologizing of Jimi Hendrix. In response to the guitar-great's deification, Cross claims his biography would "turn that black-light poster image into a portrait of a man." Naturally, he fails; no one can escape the wonderlust that Henrix's persona creates. Cross mixes the results of exhaustive research and interviews into a weak cocktail, diluting the legend of one of America's most exalted guitar players, while watering down Hendrix's humanity as well.

It's a pity that the same process that churns out Pop music determines the opportunity to write biographies of enigmatic superstars. Cross carries on like a sophomore rock star himself—one who has won praises for his freshman release, Heavier Than Heaven: A Biography of Kurt Cobain. As if humanizing rock 'n roll demigods is his raison d'etre, Cross plods through the narrative reinterpreting the sixties through a narrative tone more limp than objective, apparently oblivious of his pedantic style. The sex-and-drugs legacy of the sixties is reinterpreted for a generation who feels more for a computer screen than a fellow human being. Hendrix's own passions are glossed over in favor of prurient gossip. That Hendrix pretending to be gay to get out of the army, was scandalous enough to get press attention for the book, but did little to arouse the interest of fans. So what am I supposed to end up feeling after reading this bio? Sad for a native son who couldn't handle having his dreams come true? Angry at a nation that tempers talent through ridicule and rejection? Satisfied with a glimpse of his childhood? Or simply confused about what the author is trying to accomplish?

First off, this book is evidence that humanizing Hendrix cannot be done. Jimi Hendrix IS a god! He is the Orpheus of our age, who promised NOT to return from the underworld. Hendrix mastered feedback like it was Pegasus, and rode his Marshall stacks into synesthetic heaven. There is more than reason causing youngsters who've just been seduced by a fretboard to pore over his tabulature—there is something lurking inside his music, calling that anima deep in our own dreams. Perhaps it is not Cross's fault—Hendrix is too much to fit in a book. His whole life was more than just twenty-seven years. He was more than his peers; those others who are now barely reaching divinity. Among those who could've perhaps been annointed Messiah on their own, even after nearly a century of play, stand below him now, he who ascended (in less than a decade) to the pantheon, like lesser Bodhisattvas in a Tibetan mandala. How can anyone simply humanize such an awesome personality? Certainly not Cross, who himself succumbs to mythologizing as he fantasizes about Hendrix and Joplin in a dressing-room at the Fillmore West—a veritable clash of the titans, ain't it!

An apparently unintentional achievement in this biography is an illumination of racial disparity in Pop music, especially through the sixties. Initially rejected by the Black community, repeatedly fired from the Chitlin Circuit and literally chased out of Harlem, Hendrix came very close to quitting in the early stages of his career because his flashy nonconformity had no place in R&B. A performer was expected to conform his clothing, his moves, his very performance in order to highlight the front man, and only occasionally was the front man was alowed to be outrageous too. Today, the opposite is true in Black music: non-conformity and outrageousness is embraced as a part of the artist's perogative. It causes one to wonder just how much Hendrix paved the way for George Clinton, Boosty Collins, and Prince. I suspect that Cross is not entirely fair, either: he seems to dwell overmuch on how mistreated he was by his own people, and yet he glosses over the abuses wrought on Hendrix by his White handlers and entourages.

It was the White community who ultimately nourished, and and then strangled Hendrix's Blues roots. Those (predominately British) peers, who, if they saw themselves through Black people's cultural mirror would appear as thieves and charlatans, birthed through Hendrix a new strain of Blues that was not confined to a particular community, city, or even nation. These White boys grew up in street gangs, their identity defined by their affiliation to a particular Blues Master. To them, Hendrix represented a trunk-line to a primordial Robert Johnson. How much more pathetic that those influences actually laughed Hendrix off the stage. In the end, however, the White establishment were no different: his managers overworked him and discouraged him from continuing to experiment so they could get fat; girls kept him hooked on sex and drugs so they could keep him to themselves. To a man who only saw the colors in the music, he never really resolved himself to a racial divide that even England could not span. It is a quandary many contemporary artists, such as Ben Harper and Lennie Kravitz, are still struggling with.

Again, this cultural examination is too little for so great a man—one who waded through no-man's-land and brought back flowers. You see, Hendrix was more than his race as well—I knew this before I cracked open these pages. Perhaps I could forgive Cross a little if he dwelt on the music a little more. When I was in high school, a friend who would explain to me how Hendrix created his own fingerings to deal with an upside-down guitar played left-handed. I kept asking him how he KNEW this was how Hendrix played, and he never told me. He did reveal enough mystery, however, to help me fully appreciate the genius of this incredible man. He explained how Hendrix loosened the neck of his strat so the feedback would come more readily. Cross does mention Hendrix's thirst for technology, but as far as his unparalleled guitar skills, Hendrix just seems to magically pick pick it via osmosis. As far as how the Blues ran through Hendrix's veins, even less is said, and this is a shame because then perhaps Hendrix the man could've been placed in better perspective.

So in the end, this book is very much like Hendrix's recent re-issues: essentially devoid of new revelations into the considerable mythology that is Jimi Hendrix, but bound to make someone (not Jimi) rich. I suppose it had to be written, though, in light of litigation over his estate that concluded only recently. And in order to recognize the key players, some background needed to be re-hashed. So it probably is better that this book is out. And to be fair, in comparison to the other biographies and memoirs penned over the past thirty-five years, Room Full of Mirrors rings truest. But buying it is a mistake, though. Find a way to spend the money more productively instead.