** JIMI HENDRIX “Lifelines: The Jimi Hendrix Story” <i> Reprise</i>

This four-CD “biography,” combining over three hours of a 1988 radio documentary with a 70-minute Forum concert, is a sanitized, show-biz treatment that sheds no light on Hendrix’s life.

The music--official releases, alternate mixes, home demos and unreleased live tracks--is broken up by a breathless, vapid narration that outlines rock’s official Hendrix biography: Jimi discovers guitar, plays blues and pays dues, finds meteoric success, dies at 27. It focuses superficially on Hendrix the musician and “act,” minimizing the personal and social turmoil of the ‘60s.

There’s enough striking music for a valid single-disc compilation. Take the early R&B; sides featuring Hendrix as sideman, a smoking, live “Red House,” the unaccompanied demo of “Angel,” and the punchier alternate mix of “Room Full of Mirrors,” for starters. The Forum performance combines long, uninspired stretches with blazing bursts of brilliance reinforcing guitar fetishism at the expense of Hendrix the combination player, singer, songwriter and genius at sonic manipulation.

Maybe “Lifelines” worked on radio, but it comes up short--and at $50, way too expensive--on the home front. There’s too much slack for the knowledgeable Hendrix fan to wade through, and a neophyte would get more value by picking up Hendrix’s first few studio albums and renting the “A Film About Jimi Hendrix” documentary.