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List Price: $10.95 | | Publisher: Continuum International Publishing Group
Salesrank: 329986
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| Our Price: $5.75 |
| Used Price: $3.07 |
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| Media: Paperback |
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Editorial Review:
"Thirty Three and a Third" is a new series of short books about critically acclaimed and much-loved albums of the last 40 years. The authors provide fresh, original perspectives – often through their access to and relationships with the key figures involved in the recording of these albums. By turns obsessive, passionate, creative, and informed, the books in this series demonstrate many different ways of writing about music. What binds the series together, and what brings it to life, is that all of the authors – musicians, broadcasters, scholars, and writers – are huge fans of the album they have chosen.
Electric Ladyland is one of the greatest guitar albums ever made. During the recording process, Jimi Hendrix at last had time and creative freedom to pursue the sounds he was looking for. In this remarkable and entertaining book, John Perry gets to the heart of Hendrix's unique talent - guiding the reader through each song on the album, writing vividly about Hendrix's live performances, and talking to several of Hendrix's peers and contemporaries.
Jimi Hendrix's Electric Ladyland (Thirty Three and a Third series) Reviews:
Thumbs down 
2008-07-02 - Ya need this if you are a complete Hendrix nut. But the author attempts musicological analysis where people like Velvert Turner, Wolf Marshall, Andy Aledort, and others have done an excellent job already. I needed some historical and political analysis but none was forthcoming, mostly because the author is an Englishman and deals with Hendrix through that social lens. This is an otherwise excellent series of books, but I implore the publisher to get a Yank to do another one on Hendrix. Maybe someone affiliated with the Hendrix museum up in Seattle, Washington USA. Heck, let ME write the Hendrix volume. I have all the bios, recordings; even the instruments and effects of the sort used by Hendrix. I'll write the publisher directly and see if they'll give me the gig.
Superb 
2007-09-18 - Very interesting, as usual for the 33 1/3 series. Found out many details about the record and Jimi I did not know about.
Recommended ONLY for the neophyte 
2004-09-10 - If you've read anything about Hendrix beyond the liner notes you will find little new here beyond the author's personal memories of seeing Jimi in concert. The actual analysis of the album is spotty at best, shedding very little light (or anything of real interest for that matter) on this masterpeice of rock music.
Considering the cost of this tiny book, there is very little bang for your buck.
Examines Hendrix's unique talent using the album
2004-09-08 - Jimi Hendrix's rock pinnacle Electric Ladyland was one of the best guitar albums ever made for the genre, affording Hendrix the creative expression and freedom he needed for the first time. John Perry examines Hendrix's unique talent using the album as a foundation for his analysis. Electric Ladyland's short stature may make it a difficult library loan, but any fan of the Hendrix sound will consider it an essential guide.
An opinion on Hendrix - far from anything new 
2004-07-26 - If your into Hendrix enough to want to find out more about Electric Ladyland, your probably already going to know everything in this book. If you've read such great Hendrix books such as 'Electric Gypsy' then you won't get much from this book other than information obtained that you've read before from 'Electric Gypsy' coloured in this authors opinion on Jimi's music.
The author lays down his opinion that reads like someone either not overly impressed by Jimi Hendrix, or someone that has trouble laying praise where it's due. The author makes big calls in this book which fall flat, for example expressing his view on how Jimi could of edited and recorded certain songs better in his opinion (not unlike like Alan Douglas made true) or ego trips like footnotes after mentioning 'Like A Rolling Stone' at Monterey can only be outdone by the rare hard to find Flamingo Club version in 1968 - where does he get that from? The Flamingo club version is near inaudiable for most of the recording with its vocals and the guitar very distorted at the very least and is no way a superior rendition than Monterey but the book has many little comments by the author like that which only makes you think, is this guy trying to brag about his Hendrix collection? Or does he just have to have a different opinion on everything to try and make his book, which really has nothing new, stand out from the pack? His opinions would be valid if he didn't try to go against the grain to just go against the grain! If you've ever heard or seen Jimi at Monterey you don't need to be told how so many people thought he played crap that night - the evidence that this is one of his greatest performances is right there on CD or on the screen as you watch it which just makes bringing up that negative side without balancing it with the many rave reviews he also got seem targeted. Why point out the bad things and not mention the good?
If you want to learn the technical side of the recording or the technical side of Hendrix, you won't learn it from this book. You'll get the classic Hendrix bio for most of it with this Authors strange comments, some bad reviews for Electric Ladyland to show Hendrix was human after all i guess and an author bringing up all his 'friends' and 'visits' to people that are well documented in knowing Jimi.
All in all, if you have no opinion on Hendrix and read this you probably won't think he's that great and get a distorted opinion on him, if you love Hendrix and read this you'll wonder why this Author bothered to write a book about Jimi in the first place other than to let us know he has so many friends that knew Jimi, was lucky enough to see him play a few times and the funniest of all, could of done some things better in his opinion.
Two stars because there's many books out there with much more information about Electric Ladyland, let alone Hendrix, that aren't trying to re-write Jimi's history from one person's perspective and critique thou it's cheap and quite funny if you have a big Hendrix library anyway.
