Robert Johnson - The Complete Collection [2LP]

Robert Johnson recorded just 29 songs, and The Complete Collection gathers them all on this UK import, the foundation stones of the Delta blues.

Cut in two sessions, in San Antonio in 1936 and Dallas in 1937, these recordings are the only ones Johnson left behind before his death in 1938 at the age of 27. His slide guitar, cutting high voice and haunted lyrics shaped generations of musicians, from Muddy Waters to Eric Clapton and Keith Richards, and the myths that grew around him, crossroads legend included, only deepened the mystique.

"Cross Road Blues" and "Hellhound on My Trail" crackle with dread and urgency, his voice and guitar sounding almost like two players at once. "Sweet Home Chicago" went on to become one of the most covered blues standards ever written, while "Love in Vain" offers a heartbreaking farewell at a railway station that the Rolling Stones later made their own. Between them sit fierce shuffles, sly double entendres and deeply lonesome laments.

Raw and still startling nearly ninety years on, these sides are the bedrock of so much of the blues and rock that followed. For anyone wanting to understand where it all began, this is the place to start.