http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYrVwGxlcFA

I’m going to turn west for my next few posts, and when we look at American folk we can’t ignore the blues. It’s an unfortunate fact that I know absolutely nothing about this genre. It’s a genre I’ve wanted to explore for a long, long time, but free time and interest simply haven’t yet coincided. I stumbled upon Hobo Blues entirely by accident about a year ago and have had a note glaring me in the face ever since: I had to work this song into a post one way or another.

You might ask how it legitimately fits into my theme. It’s certainly not about mythology or horror or anything that might immediately come to mind for the season. Quite the contrary, it calls to mind gritty dust and sweltering heat, tattered clothes and haggard spirits. But this is American folk and American tradition in a very real sense, and no old gods need be invoked to imbue it with otherwordly power. John Lee Hooker is in this video a man possessed, standing firm as steel while delivering an emotionally overwhelming performance. He taps into that same seemingly spiritual power that so many of the eastern bands I’ve featured aim to conjure, he just unabashedly draws it from within himself.