Sean Egan's Are You Experienced is a memoir of the making of Jimi Hendrix's first album. The book does go a little into the beginning and end of his life. But it focuses mainly on the making of his first album. He has interviews from many well know people in the music industry. Being that it was written 35 years after the release of this "awe inspiring" album: He could not verify a lot of the dates and places of recording.
Hendrix was born on November 27, 1942, to an unloving mother Lucille and father Al who was in the army over seas. His birth name was Johnny Allen Hendrix. Jimi's mother left him and his father (shortly after Jimi's birth) to be with her boyfriend. Which resulted in Jimi staying with friends and relatives, until his father returned home and regained custody of his son. His father renamed Jimi, James Marshall Hendrix though from this point on he would be called Jimmy. Jimi became interested in music as a child. He first played the harmonica. Then the violin until he finally "started digging guitars." None of these instruments were his due to the fact that his father didn't have much money and he didn't care for Jimi playing music. Jimi's infatuation with the guitar did not last long. Being left-handed was hard for a guitar player. It wasn't until seeing Chuck Berry and realizing he needed to reverse the strings he regained his passion. His father by coincidence had won him a guitar during a poker game. Jimi would practice whenever time would permit and learn chords from friends. Jimi played in a band called the Velvetones in junior high. Eventually Al's feelings changed and he bought Jimi his first electric guitar, a Supro Ozark 1560S.
Jimi would go on to join the army in 1961. By 1962 he was out of the army and doing session work for Starday-King. He also did backup work for such groups as Slim Harpo, the Marvelettes, and Curtis Mayfield. In 63 Jimi did his first real recording as a backing man for Lonnie Youngblood under the name Jimmy James.