This has been an old story but more researchers are leaning to this assumption. The problem is-a lot of us experts would never never admit we were wrong.

It has been said many of his contemporaries never commented on it. One writer specifically admitted-I never asked them. Why? Well-what would they have said? Many top musicians do not listen to many of their contemporaries-many many later generations listened to Johnson as a cult hero-to try to duplicate his riffs. Most failed-the list is long-and maybe we now have a reason?

Another accusation is that the producers speeded it up to really hit a larger perceived audience. The above kind of falls into the on purpose also-while he was definitely our icon-and I have heard this leveled against some classical musicians-they speed up the work to make their interpretation unreacheable.

As the pros said-the original metal stamping molds are gone. Just more mystery about a mysterious man.

A Sony engineer familiar with this recording history points out both recording locations were the same group and notorious for speeding recordings. Wish there was more info in the Guardian article.