Kind Hearted Woman Blues (SA.2580-1)

This was the very first song Robert Johnson ever recorded. Producer Don Law set up a makeshift studio in Room 414 of the Gunter Hotel. Johnson faced the wall while playing, a move often romanticized as shyness, but more likely a practical choice to use the room's corner for acoustic projection into the microphone. It's a foundational Delta blues track, notable because it's the only recording where Johnson actually plays a guitar solo in the standard sense, showing a clear, linear melodic structure borrowed from the era's piano blues.