I'm So Glad

In the dead of winter, a mysterious Mississippi musician named Skip James traveled to Paramount's Grafton studio and cut some of the most complex acoustic blues ever recorded. "I'm So Glad" is a masterpiece of blistering, lightning-fast fingerpicking, utilizing an unusual open D-minor tuning. Despite the upbeat title, James sings with a haunting, high-pitched falsetto that sounds entirely detached and eerie. The record sold almost nothing during the Depression and James vanished into obscurity, until he was rediscovered in a hospital in 1964, just in time to see the British rock trio Cream turn his obscure acoustic track into a deafening, psychedelic stadium anthem.