This Train

Though technically a gospel record, Sister Rosetta Tharpe's guitar work on this track is undeniably blues-based. She played with a heavy, distorted attack and bent strings that prefigured rock and roll by a decade, bringing the secular sound of the blues club directly into the sanctuary. Her syncopated picking and driving rhythm on this traditional spiritual influenced everyone from Chuck Berry to Little Richard, making it a cornerstone recording for the electric blues tradition.