Robert G Lee

Recorded by Norman Dayron live on the street (you can actually hear cars driving by!) in 1964 with just Robert Whitehead on drums and Johnny Young on rhythm guitar, Robert Nighthawk's slide playing (and single-string soloing, for that matter) are nothing short of elegant and explosive. Highlights include "The Maxwell Street Medley," which combines his two big hits "Anna Lee" and "Sweet Black Angel"; a mind-altering 12-bar solo on "The Time Have Come," which proves that Nighthawk's lead playing was just as well developed as his slide work; and a couple of wild instrumentals with Carey Bell sitting in on harmonica. Nighthawk sounds cool as a cucumber, presiding over everything with an almost genial charm while laying the toughest sounds imaginable…

During the last quarter of the 20th century, and thanks largely to Eric Clapton's remarkable devotion to his memory, Robert Leroy Johnson posthumously became the most celebrated Delta blues musician of the pre-WWII era. Among numerous editions of his complete works and various anthologies that combine his recordings with those of his contemporaries and followers, J.S.P.'s The Road to Robert Johnson and Beyond combines many of his essential performances with those by dozens of other blues artists from Blind Lemon Jefferson and Henry Thomas to Muddy Waters and Elmore James. 105 tracks fill four CDs with several decades' worth of strongly steeped blues that trace the African American migration from the deep south on up into Chicago. This is a fine way to savor the recorded evidence, as primary examples from Blind Blake, Charley Patton, Son House, Charlie McCoy, Walter Vincson, Skip James, Ma Rainey, Tampa Red, Kokomo Arnold, Scrapper Blackwell, Leroy Carr, Lonnie Johnson, and Peetie Wheatstraw lead directly to early modern masters like Big Joe Williams, Sonny Boy Williamson, Big Bill Broonzy, Johnny Temple, Leroy Foster, Johnny Shines, Homesick James Williamson, Robert Jr. Lockwood, Snooky Pryor, Little Walter, and David Honeyboy Edwards, among many others.

Burning Hell (recorded 1959) ranks among John Lee Hooker's most edgy and focused performances. A companion piece to The Country Blues of John Lee Hooker, it finds Hooker singing country-blues, accompanied only by his own acoustic guitar - something he rarely did after traveling north from the Mississippi Delta. Tackling several originals as well as tunes associated with Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Big Bill Broonzy, Hooker shows himself to be an excellent interpreter who could have held his own with Delta bluesmen of any era. Although his guitar playing is pretty raw even by blues standards, Hooker more than compensates with his powerful, resonant voice. Several tracks, including "Burnin' Hell" and "You Live Your Life and I'll Live Mine," are downright frightening in their intensity…