Jimi Hendrix: Voodoo Child: The Stories Behind Every Song

by David Stubbs

Jimi Hendrix began musical life on the "chitlin' circuit" in the mid-1960s, where he developed a fluid, funky guitar style, backing the likes of the Isley Brothers on the road. In 1966 Chas Chandler, formerly of The Animals, discovered him playing in Greenwich Village and shrewdly persuaded him to relaunch his career in London, from whence he could be manufactured as a pop-rock sensation and then sold back to America. The plan worked. He enjoyed instant success with hits like "Hey, Joe" and "Purple Haze." His band, which included British rhythm section Noel Redding and Mitch Mitchell, was promoted as the Jimi Hendrix Experience, cutting three albums in quick succession in 1967 and 1968. Part of the successful series that includes Rolling Stones, U2, The Doors, and others in the strong-selling and well-established Stories Behind the Songs series, Voodoo Child includes a complete discography, 90 photographs, as well as a discussion of all of Hendrix's live albums. Jimi Hendrix is very probably the greatest solo rock artist of all time and thirty-seven years after his death, he remains a best-seller. Certainly, if anyone personified the genre in its purest, most potent and inflammatory form, it was Hendrix.

Genres: Music, Nonfiction

144 pages, Paperback

First published July 7, 2003

About the author

David Stubbs is a British journalist and author, covering music, film, TV and sport. He is known for his work on the Maker’s "Talk Talk Talk" column, converting it from a two-page gossip spread into a satirical and surreal take on the rock and pop world and those characters who stalked it, both the heroes and the hapless.

Among his creations were Pepe Le Punk, a Belgian music journalist (author of Hi, I’m Mr Grunge – An Unauthorised Autobiography Of Kurt Cobain); Derek Kent, MM staff writer since 1926, wit, raconteur and pervert, and Diary Of A Manic Street Preachers Fan (who admired the group for their “intense intensitude”); The Nod Corner, the fictional journals of the Fields Of The Nephilim drummer whose scheming bandmates continually got him into hot water with lead singer Carl McCoy, who would administer him the punishment of ten press-ups. The likes of Sinead O’ Connor, Morrissey, The Mission, Andrew Eldritch, Bono and Blur were also sent up on a regular basis.

However, his most famous and beloved creation was Mr Agreeable (formerly Mr Abusing), whose weekly column was a terse exercise in unmitigated, asterisk-strafed invective scattered at all and sundry, especially the sundry, in the rock world – the various c***s, streaks of piss, f***wits, arseholes and twotmongers who raised his blood pressure often by their mere existence. Although Stubbs left Melody Maker in 1998 to work for a cross range of titles including NME, Vox and Uncut, Mr Agreeable remains an occasionally active commentator, occasionally dropping in at The Quietus to vent his ire.

- excerpted from his website: http://www.mr-agreeable.net

Librarian note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

David^^Stubbs

Reviews

[Kate · Rating 1 out of 5]

You could be forgiven for thinking that this book would include Hendrix's own thoughts on what songs he wrote were about, and about his writing and recording process. That's what I thought I was in for, but nope: instead, it's David Stubbs, writing his high-school English class expositions on each and every song on each and every Hendrix album. If that sounds like a great time to you, then do not hesitate to pick this book up; if that sounds remarkably tedious and self-indulgent, come sit over here by me.

Adding to the tedium is Stubbs's overweening adoration of Jimi Hendrix. Any negative assessment of a song is immediately, breathlessly corrected by something like "of course Hendrix's genius shines through on [some part of song]," ultimately making it clear that Stubbs is utterly unable to criticize any of Hendrix's work because he is just too infatuated with him. He makes it clear that he considers Hendrix "rock's only genius" and I rolled my eyes so hard at that line that my glasses broke. Was Hendrix a genius? I'd agree, yes. Was he rock's ONLY genius? Sir. Please.

At one point, Stubbs also refers to Hendrix as being "color-blind" in terms of race, and if you didn't know a white guy was writing this book before that moment, you know it when you get to that line. A few chapters later, the least self-aware section of the book happens:

[Fellow black musicians] had an innate understanding of the existential difficulties facing African-Americans in the 1960s to which his white counterparts, however much they worshipped him, were oblivious.

I assume when David Stubbs discovered irony dead upon his keyboard that day, he merely shoved it aside.

The book suffers from issues of copyediting as well--a couple of spelling errors, punctuation errors, and a weird conversational style that comes and goes. But what does grammar matter, when it comes to a man, his idol, and his vanity project? For that matter, what does the reader matter? (Very little, is the answer I'm pointing at here. Very little.)

[LaShana Claude · Rating 5 out of 5]

"We play our music, "Electric Church Music.' because it's like a religion to us." - Jimi Hendrix to Hugh Curry of the CBC

-Contents
1. The Meaning of the Blues
2. New York, New York, a Helluva Town
3. Ready Steady... Go!
4. Are you Experienced? We Are Now
5. Pop Goes the Festival
6. On the Road Again
7. Tilting the World Off Its Axis
8. Studio Daze. Those Hollywood Nights
9. Electric Ladyland
10. '69 Turned Out to Be Fine
11. Woodstock and Them Changes
12. Walkin' On Gilded Splinters
13. The Sky Crying
14. See You in the Next Life


" A Girlfriend Rang Up and Said You've Got To Hear This Guy Jimi Hendrix.... So I went along to see Hendrix at Blaises.... It was Like a Bomb Blowing up in the Right places." -Jeff Beck

[F.C. Etier · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hendrix aficionados would enjoy it. All the lyrics and the back stories. Good source of info on Jimi.

[Kevin Harewood · Rating 4 out of 5]

An in depth look at one of rock musics most pivotal figures. Must read for any person looking to be versed in rock history

[Tim Healy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent background behind every song written and recorded by the great musician and poet Jimi Hendrix. Great photos too!

[Jarrett · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book! Great read for any Hendrix fan