Prophet of Delta Blues, father of Blues tout-court, brilliant guitarist, initiator of crowds, throngs, armies of devotees of the Devil's Music, guitarists, above all, but not only... Seller of his own soul to the aforementioned in exchange for acquiring the right and innovative technique to spread the Word among those who were ignorant of it. A crossroads between cornfields was said to be the appointed meeting place...
Initiator of a new guitar technique that combined fingerpicking with a few explosive chords, twelve bars of blood, sex, and sweat. Possessor of a voice that, in the words of Eric Clapton, expressed the most powerful cry that the human voice could emit.
Let’s add that he was also an incorrigible womanizer and an inexhaustible drinker, two characteristics that sealed his descent into Hell to which he had dedicated his soul: he died, it seems well-established, poisoned by the bartender who gave him half a bottle of terrible whiskey mixed with a tasteless powder that led him to death in two days. The bartender was, look at the twists of fate, the husband of his last conquest, and that night RJ was playing in his establishment.
Let’s also consider him a forerunner of the 27 Club, thirty years before many epigones followed him, including Brian Jones, Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Curt Cobain, Dave Alexander, Amy Winehouse, I’ll stop here to avoid boring you.
Below is a brief series of songs that can only be described as seminal, recorded in seven months between 1936 and 1937.
From here, everything begins.
The sound quality is what it is, just move on and forget about HiFi; we're talking about something else here.
Ladies and Gentlemen, Mr. Robert Leroy Johnson (1911-1938), whose 83rd anniversary of death was celebrated yesterday.
Robert Johnson - Come on in my Kitchen