The tumultuous formative years of the musical legend are depicted in this new graphic novel
The Kiss the Sky: Jimi Hendrix graphic novel starts off running, right with his birth, right on the first page, and continues through to 1966. The thing that’s always hard to remember is that Jimi Hendrix wasn’t Jimi Hendrix for very long. This whole book is really all of his failures before he became a superstar in the world of music for what was eventually a very short while, because it ends in ’66 with him going to Europe. It’s known that at that time that’s where his experience sort of becomes existing and turning into that musical superstar prior to his death in 1970. This book revolves around those formative years, where he was constantly poor, a failure after failure, and in relationship disaster after relationship disaster. That grind really set him up to be a superstar, but it would also end up being his downfall. This book is essentially a “part one” and though it doesn’t cover everything up until those final four years of his life it certainly puts on display the decades that formed the musician and his legacy.
Now, I don’t think the writing of this book is particularly great, and I’m not sure if it’s because it’s being delivered across borders (the book is originally French), but the author tends to insert himself at weird times and it can throw the cadence off. I get it, but at the same time the word bubbles and comparisons to his life don’t necessarily help flush out the story much more than it needs. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, just a little jarring when we’re trying to connect with the narrative.
Regardless, it’s a beautifully drawn book. Jimi Hendrix’s story is, again, very sad during this particular time, but we visually get to see what builds the man that would become Jimi Hendrix, for better and for worse. The art is stunning, the contrast focuses on the line work and even though I read this on a screen no part of it feels digital. There’s a sort of dirtiness to a lot of the art that I can appreciate. The emphasis on getting faces depicted perfectly is incredible, and ties into the plot. Hendrix performed for a lot of famous people, and a lot of them roll in and out of his life, so the panels have to showcase them accurately each time, even if they never say a word. The back of the book has an interesting appendix that talks about who these people were and how they were important, and within the book they’re immediately recognizable.
Kiss the Sky: Jimi Hendrix 1942-1970 is not a long book by any stretch of the imagination, but I enjoyed it. I think it’s not one of the best biographical graphic novels that I’ve read. The story ends before the fame sets in and Jimi become JIMI, so I’ll be very interested to see if a sequel books ever comes to fruition. The book is a great first step, a primer, into what made the musician who they were and is engrossing enough to make me want to finish the story.
This review is based on a PDF copy sent to SideQuesting by the publisher. It originally appeared on The SideQuest Live for November 3, 2024. Images courtesy Publisher.
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