Customer Reviews

Jimi Hendrix: The Final Days

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

A lot has been speculated about the final days of Jimi Hendrix's tumultuous life. Between Tony Brown's excellent book and the details in Sharon Lawrence's recently-published memoir, the following sordid chain of events seem to be implied:

1. The extremely-sensitive Hendrix was unravelling under an unprecedented amount of personal and professional stress and was particularly vulnerable to negative elements during these two weeks in London. Hendrix spoke of suicide and death frequently during this period. He was essentially surrounded by sharks and sycophants and had no real support network to help him through this rough time in his life.

2. On the night of his death, he had a bad argument with his German girlfriend, Monika Dannemann, that was recounted by several witnesses interviewed by Brown.

3. Sometime after retiring, Hendrix apparently took a deliberate overdose of extremely-powerful sleeping tablets.

4. Dannemann, for whatever reason (anger/vengeance is implied) - seems to have poured wine down his throat as he lay choking on his vomit (this is hinted at by Brown, and claimed openly by Lawrence who claims she confronted Dannemann with this evidence and Dannemann did not deny it).

5. The coroner recorded an "open verdict," since a verdict of suicide would have invalidated the million-dollar insurance policies held on Hendrix by his manager and record company (evidently standard practice in the music business). Thus, Hendrix's suicide has gone down in history as an "accidental overdose."

6. (Fast forward to 1996) Dannemann committed suicide when her version of events was blown apart in a court case brought by another of Hendrix's ex-girlfriends, Kathy Etchingham.

Brown (who passed away a few years ago himself) deserves praise for doing all the research and detective work it took to pull this book together. It is horrible to ponder that one of music's greatest visionaries was driven to this end by the vultures surrounding him, as well as his own lack of discipline. Is it possible to end on a high note? At least the incredible music is still here to inspire the generations who have followed him.

I'm grateful that Mr. Brown wrote this book. Jimi is long overdue for fair treatment. He was one of those people not easily understood because of the depth of his sensitivity and individuality. But the main thing I feel concerning Jimi Hendrix is how much of a complete waste his premature death was. There is no telling what sort of musical pleasures he would have produced had he lived and had a chance to mature. Personally, as a black man that has never let himself be walled in by definitions of what "blackness" amounts to, it would have been so good to see Jimi continuing to knock down those stupid self-made racial barriers in ever more creative ways. But, alas, it wasn't to be. Tony Brown shows Jimi to be what we all are; fallible human beings who are driven by many frailties.

So many other Hendrix biographies have glossed over the circumstances surrounding Jimi Hendrix's death. Many other writers have tried to tackle this weighty subject, but none of them have succeeded. None, that is, until Tony Brown published this book. Hendrix: The Final Days spells out all of the facts, including some new elements of the hours leading up to Hendrix's death that I didn't know before I read this book. As a serious Hendrix fan, I consider this book to be an indispensible reference full of quotes and solid facts, just like the rest of Brown's books about Hendrix.

Throughout the years, Jimi Hendrix has been used too often as a posterchild for the "Drug-Free America" campaigns. The irresponsible journalists who insist on perpetuating the myth that Hendrix died of a narcotics overdose should read this book. They should read this book and then print apologetic retractions of all the lies they have spread in the name of journalism.

I've spent decades studying the lives of famed rockers, reading and viewing virtually every single item available: books,articles, interviews, videos, bootlegs, private collections, museums etc. Jimi has been the focus of most of my study--I'm a fan. No, fanatic. Take it on faith, there is a mountain of evidence to suggest that he probably killed himself. Some facts have surfaced after the release of Brown's fine book.If I were a lawyer, I'd feel very confident proving the unfortunate truth. Sadly, Jimi did nothing to support the 2 children that he *knew he'd fathered*. The legal ramifications of this were just coming to a head at the time of his death. Also, he'd promised to marry at least 3 different women in the months prior. Indeed,things seemed to be chaotic.Anyway, great book. Too bad Brown and I never met. I believe I could've helped him on this, his final book.

Interviews with all the people who were there and word for word transcriptions of the principal participants in the drama of Jimi's last days/hours.
This, plus transcriptions of all his last interviews gives a real sense of how the last few weeks panned out for Jimi.
Invaluable for the tracking down, interviewing and then detailed recounting of Jimi's last evening while the people involved were alive and compis mentis.
E.g.
1. Invaluable for the account of the ongoing argument between Monika and Jimi on that last evening.
(i.e.. the account of people at Pete Cameron's party shouting down from the window "f***k off and leave him alone" when Monika repeatedly rang the intercom of the flat in the early hours of the fateful last morning give an idea of how Monika must have been feeling).
2. Invaluable for exposing and comparing the conflicting accounts (even her own self-contradicting/conflicting accounts) of Jimi's last hours according to, on the one side Monika and on the other the Ambulance men, policemen called to the scene of his demise, plus the Doctors at the hospital.
3. Invaluable for insight into Jimi's state of mind and behaviour with the confirmation by Judy Wong that Jimi HAD told people that he and Monika were engaged to be married; and also of Kirsten Nefer's detailed account regarding how he had also proposed to her a few days before.
4. Incomparably invaluable for the author's having had the confidence of (and therefore access to) Monika Dannemann over a period of a few years and therefore being able to question her on her previous versions of events when the conflicting accounts of these others were made public.
A very valuable addition to the wealth of books on Jimi's short but very creative and thus influential life.

This book presents a clear, thorough account of the last days of Jimi Hendrix. After reading this book, I had a MUCH better idea of what Jimi might have been going thru. The photos were also a nice treat. If you are a Jimi fan, Buy this book!

Persons who read this book should first understand the perspective from which it is written. Tony Brown was from Britain and knew Hendrix from a uniquely British vantage point. This is why he isolates the particular time period of Hendrix's last few weeks of life after arriving in England for a European tour. The book is extremely valuable for those interested in Hendrix's personal state and doings in his final days, and is no doubt written to allow those curious about how exactly Jimi died to find out the details.

'Final Days' is instrumental towards discovering all those things affecting Jimi during this period and relating them to the interviews he gave and other personal statements witnessed by those around him. The book does a good job illustrating the various stresses and career problems affecting Jimi during this tour in a way that wasn't covered in other Hendrix books. Brown manages to arrange all these problems, such as Jimi's business problems relating to lawsuits, his malevolent manager Michael Jeffery, issues with girlfriends, drug use, health issues, and the accumulative ill effects they had on Jimi, in a coherent way. When one sees the true reasons behind Jimi's demise the commonly-held claim that Jimi "burned-out" towards the end is shown to be woefully unjust. In any case, Brown shows in detailed account how all these things accumulatively contributed to the troubling events that led up to Jimi's death.

This book is critically important for those wanting to know the circumstances around Jimi's death. Those who read it should know that it is written in the context of a movement, started by Jimi's English girlfriend Kathy Etchingham around 1990, to discover the true facts behind how Jimi died. Monika Dannemann and Kathy Etchingham had gotten into a legal dispute over their versions of Jimi and his death. Because of this Kathy went out and interviewed all those at the scene and got some very damning information to prove Monika was lying about her version of events the morning Jimi died. Monika was successful up to that point in using British libel laws to prevent having to explain the conflicts in her story. 'Final Days' (1997) came out right after Monika Dannemann was found dead in her Mercedes from fumes. So it is important to note that Brown was writing 'Final Days' in this context as a summation of what was known up to then, and that his book was the first book publication to expose this controversy over how Jimi died to the public.

The book's main purpose gets going on page 99 under the chapter "Final Days". In the last half of the book Brown assembles all the known eyewitness accounts, personal anecdotes, official stories, autopsy data, and just about everything known about Jimi's last days in a way that exposes some serious questions over how Jimi died. Brown lays everything out on its own but arranges it in such a way that the conflicts become obvious. I personally think Brown suspects more than he's admitting but as a major Hendrix author is avoiding something he can't prove due to the tenuous nature of British libel laws. Whatever the reason, we owe Brown a tremendous debt for providing us the clues to show Jimi died by ways other than that which the official account indicates. Brown has very effectively established a structurally-sound set of stone front steps and entryway to a house of evidentiary horrors that has yet to be fully and cohesively brought to its correct conclusion. What Brown has done is created the solid building materials for a book that has yet to be written, one that, unfortunately, will prove the evidence to show Jimi Hendrix was murdered.

If I were to criticize 'Final Days' and Brown's approach I would say that, with as much commendable research and expository information as Brown achieved, the book was underdeveloped and could have gone further in its coverage and conclusions. For instance, Brown should have gone further into Monika's story to Sharon Lawrence and shown how she made-up the "washing 'sick' off Jimi's face with wine" story to cover for the fact she knew Jeffery waterboarded Hendrix. The book is much more meaningful to those who have done greater research behind Hendrix's death and looked into Michael Jeffery's background and motives. Those who have read books explaining the banks Jeffery kept Jimi's money in, and their relationship to a notorious intelligence underground, would understand the reasons for the conflicts in the official stories, and motives for Jimi's murder, and lack of any real investigation with so much obvious evidence. From reading 'Final Days' I'm not sure if Brown understood the full background behind the real motives and reasons behind Jimi's death. They've recently become public with road crew member Tappy Wright's admission that he heard Michael Jeffery confess to murdering Jimi. I suspect Brown was aware of all this but limited himself to just stating the facts in order to prevent a reaction that might interfere with the delivery of his evidence. In any case, no matter how it was written, we can't express enough gratitude for what is basically a Rosetta Stone to the evidence behind Jimi's murder. Brown, for whatever reason, is leaving it to others to figure-out and setting-up the groundwork for a bombshell of a book, that is yet to be written, which proves Jimi's murder.

What really amazes me, from the comments of those that have read this book, is how many people don't see the clues and come to the conclusion that Jimi committed suicide or died by accident. These people should realize there's serious evidence to prove Jimi Hendrix was murdered. As Brown shows, the forensic evidence was never really examined in any competent way. A true examination of the medical and circumstantial forensic evidence proves, beyond a doubt, that Jimi was murdered by alcoholic waterboarding in combination with barbiturates - a classic intel covert murder method. You very simply can't be knocked-out on sleeping pills and have what a medical doctor described as "bottles worth" of wine inside your lungs and stomach and only have a 5mg/100ml blood alcohol content. It's very simple, you can't drink bottles of wine while you're passed-out and Jimi couldn't have drank the wine earlier because it would have reflected in his blood alcohol content. Why the late Tony Brown chose not to follow-through on his evidence I don't know but he has set-up an explosive book for someone else to write. And we thank him for that.

This is a VERY, VERY GOOD READ.It Tells U what, why, how, & who...if U know how to read between the lines (wink, wink). :-(

it's sad to think of this genius untimely death.this book is really focused and gives solid inside details.Tony Brown does a wonderful job.looking at what has happened in music since his death you have to wonder what other directions he would have gone in.many questions we will never know but we still have his genius work and that is timeless.

First of all, jimi did not commit suicide...plain and simple. Even Mitch Mitchell and Billy Cox have stated that jimi didn't believe in suicide because he believed that if you committed suicide then your soul would never be allowed to rest in peace. This book only focuses on rumors...it doesn't focus on the facts. So, if you wanna book that realisticly talks about the cause of jimi's death then this book is definetly not for you.