For twenty-five years I danced my heart out to what people were calling the blues, but my soul was rarely stirred. Then one summer night in 2003, my hunger for bona fide blues was satisfied when South Side Slim welcomed me into his namesake, the south side of Los Angeles. As I walked past flames cresting a rusted barrel into my first juke joint and heard the old blues guys growling their hearts out, I knew I would not be leaving anytime soon. For the next six years, I recorded Slim's story: pretending with a broom in the Oakland of the Black Panthers, pursuing recognition amid shootings and selling in Hollywood, and finally sitting down and playing, homeless and alone, in a South Central Los Angeles trucking yard.