Jimi Hendrix Claimed to be Gay

SEATTLE -- In a new biography about the Rock legend, Charles Cross writes that Jimi Hendrix pretended to be gay in order to be discharged from the Army.

Hendrix’s subterfuge, contained in his military medical records, is revealed for the first time in the biography "Room Full Of Mirrors."

Hendrix always claimed that he was discharged after breaking his ankle on a parachute jump, but his medical records do not mention such an injury. Instead, Hendrix complained to a military psychiatrist that he was in love with another man in his squad.

He was then recommended for discharge due to his “homosexual tendencies.”

Hendrix was legendary for his appetite for women and it is very unlikely that he in fact was gay, Cross says. The only reason he had enlisted in the first place was to avoid jail time after having stolen several cars.

The biography "Room Full Of Mirrors" is being published this summer, 35 years after Hendrix' death on September 18 1970. Hendrix died of an overdose of sleeping pills at the age of 27.