Top 500: 22. The Complete Recordings

For those that have not heard Robert Johnson before, this is a must. Yes you can skip the alternate takes of the same recording. Those are realy there for the seriously obsessive folks (like me). There are a lot of folks out there that believe this is the birth of the blues. Probably not true. Robert didn't invent it, blues is actually rooted in early African work songs and songs were documented as early as 1901 in the US. And certainly W C Handy predated Robert who was only born in 1911. Of course there is not a lot of recordings available that early either. Robert did, however set up a lot of progressions and melodies that have become standard blues fair. He also encompasses the essence of the genre, particularly the crossroads myth. After hearing about Robert Johnson my whole life and his great influence, I was amazed to learn that he actually only recorded  on 2 occassions, with a total of 29 songs... That's it, 29 songs recorded in 2 sessions and we are still talking about it and people are still recording their own versions of those songs. If you you listen to music regularly you will probably recognize at least half of these tracks. This 2 disc set is everything that we have of Robert Johnson and it is the root of everything after it.