MICK MCSHANE is roused by a band whose socialism laces every line of every song with commitment and raw passion
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The real stuff of legend
TONY BURKE recommends a biography which sets the record straight on the great blues musician Robert Johnson
New releases from Mountain, Soul Asylum and Michael McDermott
ALEX HALL is disgusted by the misuse of ‘emotional narratives’ to justify uninformed geo-political prejudice
SUE TURNER welcomes a thoughtful, engaging book that lays bare the economic realities of global waste management
JOHN GREEN welcomes an insider account of the achievements and failures of the transition to democracy in Portugal
SIMON PARSONS applauds an imaginative and absorbing updating of Strindberg’s classic
PETER MASON is enthralled by an assembly of objects, ancient and modern, that have lain in the mud of London’s river
THOUGH he only made 40 recordings, US blues artist Robert Johnson’s legacy has endured for over eight decades and his songs are now part of the blues canon.
Those recordings — some were never issued and others were alternate takes — were made in 1936 and 1937, yet even with such a modest catalogue Johnson’s influence has stretched from the late 1930s to the post-war Chicago blues era of Muddy Waters, Elmore James and Howlin’ Wolf through to the 1960s, 1970s and beyond.
The list of the great and the good who’ve interpreted Johnson’s material is pretty endless. Cross Road Blues got a thunderous version by Cream at their 1969 farewell concert in London, while Love In Vain was covered by the Rolling Stones on the album Let It Bleed and I Believe I’ll Dust My Broom by Ike & Tina Turner.
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