Robert Plant Cruises Through Hill Country on ‘Charlie Patton Highway (Turn it Up, Pt. 1)’

Robert Plant shared “Charlie Patton Highway (Turn it Up, Pt. 1),” from the upcoming anthology Digging Deep, out October 2nd on his Es Paranza label.

“I’m lost inside America/I’m turning inside out,” Plant sings over a slow-burning guitar. “I’m turning into someone else/I heard so much about.”

“I spent time in the hill country of north Mississippi around Como, dropping back to Clarksdale, the incredible center of black music talent over the years,” Plant said of the track. “I weaved my car through the Delta back roads, listening to the remarkable protestations of Mississippi AM radio. I was looking at my world and my times from this unfamiliar place and found myself exposed to a nightmare world of half-truths.”

“Charlie Patton Highway (Turn it Up, Pt. 1)” also appears on Plant’s upcoming Band of Joy Volume 2. It’s one of the three unreleased songs off Digging Deep, alongside “Nothing Takes the Place of You” and “Too Much Alike (Feat. Patty Griffin).”

Digging Deep consists of 30 tracks over two CDs, available for physical purchase and download. It includes contributions by Griffin, Jimmy Page, Buddy Miller, Phil Collins, Nigel Kennedy, Richard Thompson and others.

Digging Deep coincides with the release of Season Three of the Digging Deep with Robert Plant podcast. Five new episodes will premiere every two weeks, recorded earlier this year at London’s Rough Trade East.