Voodoo Child: The Jimi Hendrix Collection

Critical reception

In a five-star review for Blender magazine, Robert Christgau said Voodoo Child was an improvement over the 1997 compilation album Experience Hendrix because apart from "Manic Depression", it did not leave out any crucial songs. He also believed the second disc featured undefinitive but revealing live recordings that made it Hendrix's best live album. Nicholas Taylor from PopMatters felt the alternate versions on disc one were of mixed quality but that the two-disc set still offered listeners the most thorough overview of Hendrix's precarious artistry, particularly the live disc: "We hear him at his glorious studio best, we hear his less than stellar studio experimentation, and we hear his sometimes wildly exhilarating, sometimes horribly messy, live performances."

In a three-star review, AllMusic's Lindsay Planer wrote that considering the difficulty in curating a compilation of Hendrix's music, Voodoo Child's exceptional song selection and sound quality made it successful as "a thumbnail sketch of Hendrix in both a studio and concert environment ... a great touchstone for anyone wishing to begin their Jimi Hendrix experience". Rolling Stone journalists Paul Evans and Nathan Brackett gave the album four out of five stars in The Rolling Stone Album Guide (2004), as did Colin Larkin in The Encyclopedia of Popular Music (2011).

Track listing

All songs written and composed by Jimi Hendrix, except where noted.

Charts