Jimi Hendrix (1EMA) Group ②

Jimi's Biography

Hendrix taught himself how to play guitar when he was 15 years old because his father encouraged him, and in 1959, at the age of 17, he dropped out of high school and worked odd jobs while performing with his band, the Rocking Kings.
In 1961, he joined the United States Army as a paratrooper, and during this time, he formed a band called King Kasuals but after 1 year, in 1962, he got injured and broke his ankle at a parachute jump, so he was discharged.

James Marshall Hendrix, “Jimi” Hendrix, was an American guitarist, singer, and songwriter, one of the most influential electric guitarists in the history of popular music, and one of the most celebrated musicians of the 20th century.
He was born on november 17, 1942 in Seattle, United States, and died of asphyxia while intoxicated with barbiturates on September 18, 1970, in London, England.

Jimi started using LSD in 1967 when he met Linda Keith. After this episode, he would usually use cannabis, hashish, LSD, and amphetamines during his touring.
Also having problems with alcohol, as sometimes he drank in excess or mixed it with drugs. During these episodes, Hendrix would become violent.
Even getting to the point where he hit his girlfriend, Carmen Borrero, above her eye with a bottle of vodka while being drunk in a jealous rage.

Jimi's childhood :

Hendrix had 3 sisters and 2 brothers, and he had a very difficult childhood. Lucille Jeter, his mother, gave birth to him when she was only seventeen. In addition, Hendrix's mother and father, James Allen Hendrix, had alcohol problems and fought violently when drunk. His parents couldn't find steady jobs so the family moved house constantly, staying in cheap hotels or apartments in Seattle. And on December 17, 1951, Jimi's parents got divorced when he was nine years old and because of that, he saw very little of his mother, as his father took over his custody. After that, on February 2, 1958, his mother, Lucille passed away.

Introduction to Jimi's career

Describing Jimi Hendrix's career is a hard job to do with just a few words considering the amazing guitarist he was and his incredible abilities never seen before.

Jimi Hendrix and bands
❂ He acts in many bands, some famous and others not so famous, starting building a great carrier in your band called Blue Flames, and after, The Beatles, Rolling Stones, The Who, and Eric Clapton, including that he played backup for such performers as Little Richard, B.B King, Sam Cooke, and the Isley Brothers. Another partnership firmed was in mid-1966, when Hendrix met Chas Chandler, a bass player of the British rock group the Animals, who signed an agreement with Hendrix to become his manager. Chandler convinced Hendrix to go to London, where he joined forces with bassist Noel Redding and drummer Mitch Mitchell. Furthermore, in all of them, he was praised for his work, owning a lot of prestige and fame in his life.❂

Little Wing:
Part of the album Axis: Bold As Love, in Little Wing, Hendrix brings all of his talents, with an execution completely of emotion, becoming one of his most listened to music until today. The lyrics referenced the hippie movement, which was in relevance at the time it was released.

The guitar player has a great number of fantastic musics that are popular until now. In his resume, we can highlight works like Little Wing, Purple Haze, and Voodoo Child.

Purple Haze:
One of the reasons why the Jimi Hendrix Experience became the biggest of Jimi Hendrix career, Purple Haze is a big representation of the style of Jimi as a guitar player. In the music, Jimi mixes with mastery his abilities of the blues and the rock, creating a fantastic and psychedelic performance.

Voodoo Child:
A tribute to his grandmother of indigenous descent, Voodoo Child is another part of the grateful album Jimi Hendrix Experience. This work shows one more time the brilliant mastery of Hendrix with the guitar, taking advantage of all of his artistic gifts.

Importance of representativity on media:
Representativity of people of color is important in media because it can bring more visibility to these communities. It plays a major role, in a way they can identify themselves within pop culture while growing up, helping to build up self-esteem and forming their own identities. While also deepening our understanding and empathy towards our differences.

Jimi Hendrix was an important symbol to people of color for showing representativity in the music industry and media

His experiences with race issues:

Although many people frequently tried to ignore the fact that Hendrix was a black man, as was said by Jeremy Wells, author of "Blackness Scuzed: Jimi Hendrix's Invisible Legacy in Heavy Metal": "he's still seen by many as a musical genius who just happened to be black instead of a man whose genius was inseparable from his race." The fact is that his race has a big impact on him and his whole career. On one hand, he was very criticized by the black audiences that view him as a black man playing white man's music and got to the point where some black radios refuse to play his music. But also white audiences view him as a stereotype "a hypersexual black man who was high all the time -- instead of a serious musician." As well as the reality that through his time in R&B sideman and star he experienced racism and that his music was directly influenced by his experience as a black man in America.

Three reasons why they say Hendrix's race mattered:

1- He was post-racial before the term was even invented, where he lived in a stage that "racial prejudice was no longer the main issue". As he lived with mainly white people, and his audience is white. But also, by close look lots of critics identify his rhythms to be deeply shaped by blues and inspired by many black artists. "Yet no matter how far out Hendrix's guitar sounded, the foundation of his music was always black music," says CNN's entertainment article.

2- He was racially profiled.
In a time where racism was active in the US and a black man could be killed for dating a white woman, many of his girlfriends and fans were white. And his stereotypical portrait as a hypersexual black man helped him to grow in his career. But many of his fans couldn't even imagine the experiences he's been through for being "from a different race".
"Hendrix left his hometown of Seattle because of racism, says Cross, his biographer. He grew up in a world of abject poverty and family turmoil that was typical of black families at that time. When he was a teenager, he was arrested on dubious charges of driving in stolen cars and given the choice of being jailed or enlisting in the Army, Cross says. He enlisted and became a paratrooper. [...] Hendrix continued to experience racism as a musician."

3- He wanted to be accepted among black people. Because he didn't want to be restricted by racial categories, he had a lifelong journey in a quest to be accepted by "his own people". His goal was to get to a point where his music could be universal, and there wouldn't be any white rock or black rock. The thing is, in this decade America suffered from racial segregation, so according to Cross: "Because Jimi played to white fans in an era of Black Power and separatism, they felt that he had betrayed his own race by having a white band and playing to an audience that was primarily white."