Skip James’ “Devil Got My Woman” is an example of the Delta-Blues Style. This is apparent due to two aspects of the song. Firstly, though it may seem an obvious thing to say, it sounds like the blues. Unlike the Piedmont Style, which has a more ragtime feel, “Devil Got My Woman” sounds distinctly blues-like. It’s melancholy tune, slow strumming guitar, and lyrics which detail the situation that broke a man’s heart all follow the classic blues style.

The song begins with an instrumental introduction that is a common strumming guitar, with some grace notes. The music does not change as the vocals begin and do not seem attached to the singer at all. However, throughout the piece the music does evolve but it does not change much. It slowly gets more complicated, adding more and more grace notes to the strumming.

The vocals are fairly repetitive and tell an interesting tale. Since the lyrics were not provided on the website I looked them up and they may be different but it is difficult to understand the singer. My interpretation of the lyrics is that the narrator of the song would rather be the devil if it meant he got the keep the woman he loves, because the devil was the only one who had the power to change her mind. However, he lost the woman he loves to the “devil” who also happens to be his best friend. Until the end of the song the lyrics make one sympathetic to this singers situation until he states that he stole his woman from his best friend in the first place, which makes one less likely to feel for the blues singer.