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Suffer to play the blues?
J.T., Hoboken, NJ 31, M, 0/25/08
I’ve always wondered about the creativity/suffering thing. It’s a connection that goes way back. The legendary founder of the blues, Robert Johnson, sang it like this: ‘There’s a hellhound knocking at my door…’, and ‘Hello Satan, I believe it’s time to go…’
A lot of people really believe that you have to sell your soul to the devil in order to make it big—especially in the music world. The story goes like this: Robert Johnson, a 20 year old Mississippi delta cotton picker at the beginning of the last century, met up with Satan at a country crossroads and made the deal. In exchange for his immortal soul, Johnson would (for a very short time, as it turned out) become the greatest blues g player the world had ever known. The part about his playing is most definitely true. His music (even on the primitive recording equipment of the time, you can hear his trademark: working the strings like three virtuosos playing at once) lives on to this day. Many of his tunes became hits in the 60s and 70 for bands like Cream and the Rolling Stones.
Don’t forget: the man still had hell to pay. Two years had not gone by before the musician was fatally poisoned by the jealous husband of one of Johnson’s (many) flings. If you really want to pursue this, I promise you: the list goes on and on. A few years back Rolling Stone magazine did a spreadsheet on the top blues players of the 20th century…and upwards of 60% died young, died tragically—victims of violence, terrible accidents, and overdose.
Anyone out there agree?