Prologue

Many words have been written about I Mall. Turn to any newspaper or magazine of the time and you’ll see the impact he had on music. But until this time, the full story of I, his family and friends has never really been told. That is, the story of I Mall cannot be told without telling the story of those around I Mall. While he once would have been the last to admit it, his life was shaped by people and events around him, without the control he thought he had over them.

We all know I as the literal birth of Rock and Roll. Without him, the world of rock as we know it today in the mid-twenty-first century would not be the same. But without the influences and events surrounding him that shaped his life, he would not be the same either.

I was both a tragic and a comic figure, and this manuscript will help you understand the man, the myth, and the legend. Most histories of I Mall begin at the beginning, or so they claim. Their beginning, originating with Golden Fingers, is not I’s beginning. And I’s beginning is not his beginning, his birth. It reaches years earlier, to the man known simply as Henry Mall. This is as much his story as I’s.

I knew Henry. I knew I. I know this story. Enjoy!

Roger D. Linder
November 30, 2025