Customer Reviews

Jimi Hendrix, Voices From Home

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For anyone who wants a little better understanding of what made Jimi Hendrix who he was, then this book is a must. This is one of my favorite Hendrix books because it is full of stories about Jimi by those that knew him best, the people that grew up with him. It is not the cheapest book but it is worth every penny. No Hendrix library is complete without this book.

Maddog's review is right on the money. This book is all about Jimmy, not Jimi. If you are looking for hype about groupies, drugs and excess, then keep looking! If you are looking for info about the person behind the image, presented in a loving and respectful way, then this is the book you need!

This book was written by Mary Willix and published in 1995 by Creative Forces (San Diego). I picked it up a long time ago and had big problems reading it. It is so rich in emotion that I had problems keeping with it. I finally got through it after months of picking it up and setting it back down, but my reading was so discontinuous that the sum effect of the book was compromised. So I got back to it this winter and made the committment to read it without interruption. The bottom line summary is that I consider Voices From Home to reside in the extreme upper end of the Jimi Hendrix literature - a must-have for anyone that really wants to understand what made Jimi tick.

Mary Willix was a childhood friend of Jimi's. She wrote this book in her words: "to settle the gut-wrenching feeling I had about his death". In the process of writing the book, she concluded: "The story of what really happened to Jimmy
Hendrix was more devastating than I had ever expected. The more I found out, the more I wanted to unravel the tangled bits of misinformation. Part of me wanted to climb the highest mountain and shout 'INJUSTICE!'".

Mary assembled comments from Jimi's friends and family. The opening chapters were from two of Jimi's best friends as a young kid growing up in Seattle: Terry Johnson and Jimmy Williams. These three met in grade school, grew up together
and learned to play music together in high school. When you read the words of Mary, Terry and Jimmy, you feel their bond of friendship and love for Jimi. This isn't some faked Andy Worhol 15 minute fame gig. What I see in their words
is consistency with respect to the forces that defined Jimi's soul. Jimi was a strongly spiritual individual and as a kid he had a huge need for love, probably due to his troubled home life. His friends knew a sensitive, intensely creative
young Jimi and they truly valued their time with him.

People have always talked about their interpretations of Jimi's song lyrics. In fact, I've often felt like some people went too far in their interpretations. The comments in Voices From Home have only solidified my opinions. Jimi's best friends repeatedly stress how Jimi loved to joke, tease and find excuses to laugh. For example, Jimmy Williams pointed out: "He could do things with a very tongue-in-cheek attitude. Of all the people I know, Jimmy was probably one of the most fun-loving, humanitarian people I've ever met. It all came from his attitude. He liked to play, he loved to give people nicknames, he always saw positive things in people."

At the same time, they admit that Jimi was fond of symbolism, but was so private about his feelings that even they couldn't speculate about the meaning of all his words. Jimmy Williams wrote: "Contrary to what some fans think, Jimmy's most significant song is not 'Purple Haze'. To know Jimmy, you have to look at songs like 'Straight Ahead." Mary pointed out how Jimi wrote of freedom, unity and love and qouted a lyric that was especially meaningful to her: "The best love to have is the love of life."

Hopefully, the above has put you into the ballpark on this book. Rather than continue to pluck out what I see as key quotes, I'll leave that to the reader to investigate. This book is an absolute gem. Essential stuff for those wanting
to get the most out of Jimi's music. If you want to understand why Jimi integrated blues, rock and jazz into his own Voodoo Child creation, I think you'd be better off to look here rather than any other source. The "how" is probably covered better in other sources, such as Keith Shadwick's Musician, but the why is much more of a roots approach to understanding the man. This book is as real as the dirt under your feet.